


(nothing left to lose)

by romanoff



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Depression, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Jealous Steve, M/M, Not Steve Friendly, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Protective Steve Rogers, Recovery, Suicide Attempt, Tony Stark Feels, Tony Stark Has Issues, but he tries his best
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-18
Updated: 2018-05-06
Packaged: 2018-08-15 19:34:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 29,309
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8069977
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/romanoff/pseuds/romanoff
Summary: An alternate universe where Steve wins the Civil War.It doesn't go well for Tony.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is all written! All of it. Like it's actually sitting, finished, on my hard drive. First time ever.
> 
> So I'll be uploading once a week (basically whenever I can remember to upload).
> 
> Just a note: post civil war, I really don't hate Steve?? But the more I wrote this, the more Steve's character kind of became... idk you'll see. Not bad; he really cares abt Tony. But yeah, like I said, it's not 100% Steve friendly. 
> 
> (Also, this is dark. Especially at the beginning. It gets better! Recovery is a tag. But yeah. It might be hard for some people, keeping in mind the tags)
> 
> (actually, also also, i realise if you read the snippet of this it's probably just a recap for you. i will be deleting the snippet)

Steve is the one who collects him from the hospital.

He signs the paper proffered, waved under his nose, and listens carefully to the doctor’s stipulations. He can’t be left alone, he says, mildly apologetic, as if this is a great burden for Steve to bear. You can’t let him near anything sharp, really you need to lock kitchen drawers and so on. No razors. If it’s possible, don’t let him near any baths. Anything he could hang a rope from. Windows, obviously, those are a problem. The doctor appears contrite and keeps smiling, like he and Steve are sharing a private joke, like Tony’s misfortune is an old shared story between the two of them, like it’s a particularly well known anecdote, and repeating it is bringing back fond memories.

So Steve takes the release papers coldly, only nods. “Right,” he says “I know. That’s obvious. Anything else?”

“A three-month probationary period,” the doctor continues, suitably chagrined. “After that there’ll be an official assessment as to his readiness to be back in the field. I mean – if that’s in the cards for you,” he says, questioning.

“I hope so, one day.”

“In which case, it’s important you don’t let him skimp on therapy. Physiotherapy, I mean. There’s nerve damage, you know, in his hands? He’ll need patience on that front. And of course,” the doctor lowers his voice slightly “there’s the matter of covering the cost of his treatment? You understand, we acted on good faith because Mr Stark was never one to default on his debts, but since the assets were seized…”

“I’ll foot the bill.”

The doctor appears relieved, like he’s happy to have avoided such an awkward situation. No one likes to be reminded of just how far Tony has fallen. “Would you like to see him?” He asks, smoothing over the sticky moment. “I can show you to his room before he collects his things?”

“I would like that,” Steve says simply. This isn’t a hospital; Tony was sectioned soon after they had done what they could do for his wrists. It’s also the best money can buy, although, like the doctor said, Tony doesn’t have much of that anymore. Steve is relieved to find that the corridors are wide and clean, the windows large, the beds cushioned with soft pillows and fresh linen. Tony is sitting in a chair – a wheelchair, Steve realises – facing a window, looking out at the dense trees. The window is locked, obviously, but still the sunlight ripples through his hair, splays on his skin.

(It makes Steve’s heart clench. He remembers other sheets, softer sheets, and a king sized bed, and Tony’s sardonic smile, the smell of smoke and whiskey and Tony talking in that low way he has, resting on his side while the sunlight pushed it’s way over his healthy, strong form -- )

Now, he’s lost a lot of weight. Steve can see his collarbones jutting out from his chest, the ridges of his spine. His hair is longer, softer, lightly curled around his sallow cheeks without any product to smooth it away. Steve never realised that Tony was naturally quite this pale, pasty; did he always have a tan? Was he always in the sun? Now, Tony appears translucent, you can see the green-blue of his veins. It makes Steve anxious for a second, like this new lines are just maps for Tony to follow the next time he is trusted with a razor.

“Tony,” Steve says quietly. “Hi.”

He’s so still. He doesn’t turn. The doctor says that Tony isn’t talkative, opens his mouth and blabbers like Tony isn’t there at all. “Leave us alone,” Steve says shortly.

He had known to expect this, Tony’s weight, his reluctance to talk. The doctor had told him over the phone that Tony was refusing to eat, that he wouldn’t pick up what they gave him and would spit out what they forced him. And so they had placed him on a feeding tube until he finally realised that, no, they weren’t going to let him die, and so he could either continue being fed by IV for the rest of his life or make that life a little easier.

But it had shocked him, Tony’s absolute desire for death, his certainty that he wanted it. Steve was always told that people who try to kill themselves and live to talk about it almost always wish they hadn’t; that in their supposed last moments, they realise how much they have to live for. It’s fucking disheartening, and cruel, awfully cruel, that there is no such realisation with Tony. The doctor at the hospital had told him – and then, apparently, some journalists too – that Tony’s marks had been large, vertical, and deep. Purposeful. When he was found, there was no sign of struggle or regret.

“I’m sorry,” is the first thing Steve can think to say. “For what happened.”

Tony doesn’t turn, but Steve can see his reflection in the window. He has shut his eyes. In reflection or stubbornness, Steve doesn’t know.

“For what it’s worth… you were acquitted. I mean – you know that, right? But no one holds you responsible, I don’t – “ I don’t hold you responsible, I never did. Why could you never fucking see that, why could you never understand I –

“I know,” Tony says, slowly. His words mash together, slur into one another like syrup, so droopy and carefully placed. “I still have lawyers.”

“Right,” Steve says. “Of course. But – you know it was a formality, right?” And Steve’s tone is near desperate, suddenly. “You know that – you never really would have been charged. Ross’s dirty dealings, that had nothing to do with you, no one wanted you – you prosecuted – “

Tony blinks, slow, uncoordinated, one eye before the other. “I know,” he says, one word dripping after another. “I didn’t try to kill myself because of what other people thought of me.”

“Then why?” Steve blurts. “Tony? Tony please, why?”

He shrugs a single shoulder. “Because I lost. Everything.”

“Not everything,” Steve tries, although he knows the words are bitter in his mouth, that – that at the time, had he been in Tony’s place, he would have felt the same way. That after the war, and after what happened, he also felt abandoned by Tony. That he couldn’t understand why Tony wouldn’t just – why he couldn’t help, or see, or at least – try to understand the way Steve, at least, tried to understand.

He knows now that both of them were too weighed down by their own neuroses, their own fear and baggage. Tony’s life had taught him that accountability was needed, Steve’s had taught him the opposite. Ultimately, there was never room for compromise.

This was an inevitable.

“You still have me, if you want me,” Steve ventures quietly.

Tony is silent for a long time. Or not silent, just – quiet, as if building up to what he has to say. Steve expects more. In the end, all he says is this:

“I lost you the day Barnes pulled you out of the Potomac.”

***

Steve had always thought he was more invested in their relationship than Tony. Tony, he thinks, always viewed Steve as a secret, and a dirty one at that. It’s not that Tony was anti what he was, it’s not that Tony viewed homosexuality, bisexuality, the in-between, as wrong, it’s just that he was practical. Tony didn’t want the stress, and if Steve was honest, neither did he. He didn’t want himself defined by who he liked to fuck; once upon a time, that information would have ruined him. Now, it would define him, it would politicise him more than he could handle, and other than random spurts of guilt when it comes to all the good he could do for the community, the controversy he would cause has always held him back.

He did love Tony, however. He was objectively aware he loved Tony more than Tony loved him. Oh, he didn’t doubt that Tony cared for him, certainly, that he loved him. Tony wasn’t in love with him, however, because Tony will not let himself be in love with anyone. He will not let himself fall that far that fast. It’s what drove him and Pepper apart, and it’s probably what softened the blow of Steve’s pursuing of Bucky.

Not that he ever wanted anything like that from Bucky, no, no. Tony’s inability to ever understand the importance of Bucky to him, and the nature of their relationship, was near mesmerising, and often infuriating. Even before he was found, Tony could casually comment on Buck in an almost callous manner, that dismissive way he sometimes has. He realises Tony was probably jealous, because he is also prone to jealousy, but that he would never admit it for risk of appearing too invested. And so for years they skirted around the topic, the only time it ever really came up being those nights Steve awoke from a nightmare, when Tony would hold him so tight, stroke his hair back from his brow, press his lips to the back of Steve’s neck.

“It’s alright,” he would would whisper. “I know, I know babe. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”

And Steve would bury his brow into Tony’s forearm, his shoulder. “Jesus I miss him,” he would breathe “you have no idea, you have no fucking idea Tony, what I would do. You don’t know, you don’t know what I’d do to have all that back.”

Tony would be silent, but he’d stroke Steve’s hair anyway. Sometimes, if Steve was really bad, he’d tell him that, if he could, he would reach back in time and give Steve everything he wanted and more, and Steve would sleep with that fantasy in his head, a world where he has Tony and Bucky and Peggy and all his friends.

Steve had not seen Tony at all between the fight in Siberia and the psychiatric ward. After Ross was denounced, and the Accords with him, Steve knew there would be a show of investigating Tony, of seeing what side was on, but Fury had assured him that he would never press charges, that it was all formalities. And he was wrong.

The public, Steve soon realised, did not care that the Accords violated a thousand human rights. They wanted blood, they wanted super-powered blood. What came out in the investigation was the full extent of Tony’s involvement in the Ultron debacle. And while the roles of Wanda and Bruce were then similarly noted, Bruce was still MIA and Wanda protected by the Wakandan amnesty won by T’challa. Tony had supported the Sovokia Accords, a document brought about by the wreckage of a city which Tony had inadvertently caused. And people found this hypocritical. They thought Tony was trying to cover his own ass. And so another, larger investigation had launched. Stark stock had plummeted, shares wiped out overnight as the market predicted Tony’s inevitable downfall. Potts had resigned, washed her hands of the whole affair, and moved to England. First there were the resignations, then the widescale redundancies, and Stark Industries had toppled. Wobbled and fallen, like a stack of cards.

In the rubble, in the aftermath, Tony was left – not penniless, exactly. Wanda – who had recently chosen to major in Economics and Business – explained that Tony still had money wrapped up in shares somewhere or other, and that he still had money in offshore accounts, but that these were frozen for the investigation. And after, when it was agreed that Tony would not be imprisoned but that it was only right he paid his share of damages, that money disappeared too.

And so. Tony Stark, alone. Potts gone, Rhodes…unwell. His fortune dwindled, his friends gone. His company, his legacy, everything he had worked for, diminished, crumbled and scattered. It was, in retrospect, easy to see why Tony reduced his life to a simple question of life and death. It must have been very satisfying to draw three lines in his wrists and call it quits.

Now, Steve helps Tony into the jumper he brought with him. It’s fall, and there’s the first bite in the air. Tony’s fingers have little fine motor control, the nerves damaged from where they were severed, so Steve has to zip up the throat and then help push his arms into the plushy parka Natasha had bought for this purpose. He pushes Tony’s feet into new, soft sneakers, and wheels him to the entrance, signs some last papers. Tony has to sign something too, but his hands are shaking so much it’s near impossible, his once slick signature now just a shaky squiggle on a dotted line. He drops the pen but it’s enough for the attendant. They give Steve Tony’s prescriptions in a plastic box and tell him, to his face, with Tony sitting right next to him and yet somehow invisible to the nurses, that Tony can’t be allowed to have control over these because he will almost certainly try to overdose.

If Tony finds that humiliating he doesn’t let on, and his face remains just as blank as it had been before. Steve decides that he’s probably used to it by now. He rolls Tony to the car, helps him into the passenger seat, and straps him in carefully, leaning over his body, intensely aware of Tony’s every movement, his every breath, and how shockingly skinny he has become. Once upon a time, Tony had been vibrant. Steve wouldn’t have been able to wrap his hand around his wrist and have his fingers meet his thumb.

They travel in silence, and as the sky darkens it begins to rain, light at first, and then just heavy. Steve puts on the radio, asks Tony is there’s anything he would prefer, and when he gets no answer settles on an eighties music station that he knows Tony likes. The windscreen wipers push away rain from the window. Tony rests his head on the door and appears to fall asleep.

Steve wakes him at the rest-stop to ask if he wants anything. Tony says no, so Steve gets him some water and a packet of sweets. Stupidly, he doesn’t think about the fact Tony won’t be able to hold them himself, and so Tony is forced to submit to the indignity of Steve unscrewing the cap of the bottle and holding it to Tony’s mouth. He thinks he makes it worse by apologising.

They reach the base in the early hours of the morning. It’s dark, but Steve can maybe just about imagine a pink lining across the bottom of the sky. Tony doesn’t let him push him and instead walks, following just behind Steve, into the main entryway, which is blessedly empty. “You’ll have your own room,” Steve promises “your own bed, soon. I swear. But – just for the first few days, we need to keep an eye on you. You can take my bed, I’ll sleep on the couch, it’s fine. You won’t even notice I’m there.”

“What happened to my room?” Tony asks quietly. Steve remembers it. He and Tony would lie there on Sunday mornings, on Tony’s plush mattress, and Tony would read while Steve drew, or sometimes if the other was tired they would rest their heads on either’s lap. The happy days, when Steve and Tony could be together and there was no right reason for them not to be, and Tony was safe and healthy and kind, with a wide smile and eyes that were embedded with permanent laugh lines.

Steve used to be so jealous of Tony’s work, the way it commanded so much of Tony’s attention. If he could have kept him in that bed all the time, he would have. Cossetted him from the world, kept him safe. He didn’t want this to happen, please, please, please, this is never what he wanted.

“It’s not – there. I’m sorry,” Steve says apologetically, and he really, really means it. “I had your things removed, I had – the bed changed. But you can take it back, I know you loved the view. The view…” Steve trails off.

“No thank you,” Tony mumbles. His hands are shaking so badly, Steve wants to still them with his own, cover them completely. “Am I allowed to be alone?” He asks “Ever?”

Steve’s silence is answer enough.

“I’d like to go to bed please,” Tony says, then, voice laden with exhaustion.

“Are you hungry?”

“No.”

“If you don’t eat…”

“They’ll section me. I know. I don’t care.”

The bluntness shocks him. “I care,” Steve says gently.

“I don’t care that you care. I want to go to bed.”

“You need to have breakfast tomorrow. I’ll have someone bring it up.”

Tony’s hand shoots out, grabs Steve’s sweater and curls there. “Do I have to see them?” He breathes, not looking up. “Do I have to – I don’t want to have to see them. I don’t want them to see me. I don’t want to, I can’t, I don’t want to.”

Steve wraps a large hand around Tony’s; his knuckles seem extra prominent. He wants to tell Tony no, that he’ll never have to see or speak to anyone ever again if that’s what it takes to make him happy again, that they can move to the mountains and live their lives as hermits as long as Tony promises he won’t ever, ever try to take his life again. But he owes Tony the truth. “You’ll have to see them eventually,” he says quietly.

Tony accepts this without protest. He withdraws his hand. Steve helps him to bed; takes off his shoes, socks. He tries to take the coat and sweater but Tony complains that he’s cold, too cold, and he wants to wear them. Steve tells him he knows the sheets will warm him up fast, and they can always turn up the heating. Tony asks him what the problem is, he just wants to wear the parka, what’s the problem? He’s not hurting himself, Steve doesn’t have to dictate his every action, and Steve relents quickly, eases off fast, and leaves a glass of water next to Tony’s bed that he knows he won’t be able to drink without spilling it first.

He settles on the couch; he legs poke over the end almost comically. He doesn’t sleep, and neither does Tony.


	2. Chapter 2

They had found Tony in the bathtub of his apartment in D.C.

It was during the trials, after Stark stock crashed and Potts had resigned. Bath filled half-way, a dark brown, and Tony listless. He had survived, obviously. Then tried to climb out a window. Then tried to starve himself.

And now he sleeps curled on his side, sweltering under a duvet, and parka, and sweater. He’s kicked off his sweats in the night, so his legs are bizarrely bare other than the thick coat. And they’re so thin, Steve thinks, once, Tony had laid in bed while Steve slowly made his way up his left leg, pressing kisses gently to the sensitive soles of his feet, calves, his soft inner thighs. Tony had snorted and giggled and fucked Steve the way he liked to be fucked, long and slow with a good burn in his muscles and sweat on his skin as he pushed himself back on Tony.

He can’t imagine Tony ever willingly doing something like that now, laughing as Steve worked himself up in bed and kissing him deeply when he was finished, with his spend dripping down Steve’s balls. He can’t imagine him ever sleeping in a bed like he owns it, or ordering Steve to do anything at all. He wants to brush Tony’s soft hair from his brow, cheeks, but he knows that luxury is no longer afforded to him, not after what happened.

Steve tells Friday to have someone bring up a simple but big breakfast, and its Natasha who arrives at the door with two sandwiches with a chicken and mayo filling. “Can I see him?” She whispers, voice low. “Is he awake? I want to – “

“Still sleeping,” Steve says, taking the tray. “I don’t know if he’s up to seeing anyone yet.”

And Tony continues to sleep, all the way through lunch, right up until dinner. When he finally wakes, his sandwich is stale, the parka rucked up to his hip, skin flushed and hair greasy. He drags the back of his hand over his face, sits up, smacking his lips the exact same way he always used to after a particularly long snooze. His cheeks have more colour, Steve thinks, although that could be wishful thinking. “What time?” He croaks.

“Eight. You slept a long time.”

“Tired,” Tony mutters, and he burrows back down under the covers anyway. Steve wonders if Tony is maybe sleeping to avoid eating.

“You have to have dinner,” he says. “I can have something made for you, nothing huge, just something to tide you over.” And he expects resistance, but Tony just mumbles ‘okay’ and let’s his eyes fall shut.

Steve is momentarily elated at Tony’s easy capitulation. He calls down, and within ten minutes Natasha arrives with two burgers without buns, a side of salad, and some soda. She carefully sets the tray down on the side table and picks up the old, untouched, stale sandwiches. She puts a straw in the drink so Tony won’t have to lift it with his shaky hands, and she’s cut the meat into small cubes so he won’t have to. She helps prop Tony up on pillows, saying nothing, not even making small conversation, but showing her ease and forgiveness, her own repentance, in the gentle way she smoothes the blanket over his lap, places the tray carefully on his knees, and brushes hair that has stuck to his cheek behind his ear.

Steve wishes he could do that, that he could be so casual with his touches. But he knows that Natasha, for all the trouble she caused Tony, was always on his side. That she saw Tony’s view in a way that Steve never could. And so Tony doesn’t appear to mind so much when she holds the straw to his lips and lets him drink. She removes two candy bars from her pocket, and Steve recognises them as that high-calorie junk that they used to feed the undernourished children on his peace missions to Cambodia. Natasha leaves them surreptitiously on the bed and exits smoothly; Steve envies her this, her ability to interact with Tony and her freedom to come and go without fear of consequence.

Tony chews slowly, methodically, and Steve watches as he swallows every bite. He opens the bars, and Tony manages to eat all of one and half of the other, which he reckons is an achievement. Tony asks to go to the toilet, and Steve has to wait outside the door, holding it only slightly ajar to give him privacy. After that, Tony says he is tired again. He says he wants to sleep. Steve doles out his medication: one for pain, one for sleep, one for whatever mental condition it is the doctors think Tony has. He rests his head on the pillow, one hand curled by his head, and for the first time Steve catches a glance at the white bandage sticking out from under his coat.

***

Steve is trying, Tony knows. Oh he is intimately aware of how hard Steve is trying. It’s guilt, something whispers inside his head. He’s guilty, he’s guilty and so he thinks he can make this better by helping you. You’re his penance.

No, another part of him will says no, Steve was always good to us. He was always kind. He’s worried about us. He loves you, he wants to help you.

If he loved you, the first voice spits, he would have listened to you. He would have compromised with you. He never would have left us in Siberia to go with Barnes, he never would have set the dogs on your trail and left you to rot –

No no no, the second voice will say, you know Steve is damaged, Tony, you know that. You know he’s always been damaged, were you really surprised when he chose Barnes? All those nights he cried in your arms because of what he had lost, he’s just as damaged as you are, and he needs help, he needs your help, what you have is still so salvageable –

The second morning after he arrives at the old facility breakfast is served to him cut into bits. Bacon, hash browns, eggs. He doesn’t get a knife, but he does have a plastic spoon. His orange juice isn’t even in a glass, someone has put it in a sippy cup, like he’s a child. His meds, the exact number of pills he has to take today, are in a small plastic box which is laid out on the tray next to his food and his hands shake so much it’s near impossible to get them into his mouth. He hates that he’s grateful for the bottled cup, that it means he won’t have to worry about spilling OJ on himself, and that he won’t have to suffer the indignity of having someone (inevitably, Steve) clean him up.

He worries, though, about his hands. He wishes now that he had chosen a cleaner method of death, why hadn’t he just shot himself in the head? True, he didn’t have weapons on him during the investigation, but who was going to stop him from buying one? Or why didn’t he just cut deeper, or harder. Why didn’t he jump out the window? Why did he go for the one method that has left him damaged in the aftermath?

The doctor said that the nerves will repair themselves eventually. When Tony does his exercises (squeezing a ball in each hand) he feels them tingle and burn, and the doctor says that’s good, that’s the muscles fixing themselves, growing again. In the meantime, he eats food that someone else has cut for him. He ignores the warring voices in his head. He is civil to Steve.

“Good morning,” he says, too cheerfully. Tony doesn’t know if Steve is genuinely happy he’s here or just trying to put on a brave face. “How are you feeling this morning?”

It’s hard to articulate just what Tony feels. Numbness feels like a cliché. Certainly, he feels something, but it’s often clouded with drugs and exhaustion. He feels… he tries not to think about it too much. Doesn’t want to think about everything he’s lost. Any moment he begins to think he might be alright again, he remembers he’s penniless, that everything he built is gone. His legacy is destroyed; Iron Man is dead. The company his father built is no more, the team he tried to save taken from his hands. The world he so desperately wanted to protect no longer needs him or wants him, has actively rejected him. It’s not a question of how you kill yourself, the first voice hisses, it’s a matter of when. One day they’ll let their guard down and then you can end it. And don’t fuck it up this time.

“Better,” Tony says, and Steve’s smile is too genuine. It hurts that Steve wants to help him, now, after everything that’s happened. Tony wants to ask where all this concern was when he left Tony in Siberia.

He’s damaged, the second voice keeps telling him, softly softly. Tony you know that, you know he’s always been so lost. You always protected him. Look how young he is, Tony, he was so scared, and he got Bucky back, the one thing he wanted more in the whole world. You could have supported him, you could have just supported him through that, Tony, compromise could come later. You were supposed to be strong for him, you were always supposed to be strong for –

“I was thinking,” Steve says “maybe we could go for a walk today. Out to the lake. The forest is so beautiful this time of year, you wouldn’t want to miss it.”

Steve seems to regret the words almost as soon as he’s said them, which Tony finds quite funny. He thinks he’s offended Tony, because obviously Tony was very willing to miss it, and so almost just to humour him Tony says “Sure. Okay.”

And Steve is so relieved. “Natasha said she’ll take you shopping. To – you know, to get new stuff. You’ll need some shirts, jeans, shoes. We’ll get you a new suit. It’ll – “

“What happened to my old stuff?”

A furrow has formed in Steve’s brow. “Well, most of it was in storage. You know, when they – sold the tower. I think – lots was sold off, uh. The stuff you had here…”

“You got rid of it,” Tony says quietly. See? The first voice hisses, he wanted to get rid of you! He is desperate to get rid of you! They all are! They’re all too civil to say it, Tony, but they want us gone! Why are you forcing yourself to stay, no one wants you, you don’t even want you, why don’t –

No, the second voice says, Steve got rid of your things because it hurt too much, Tony. Ask him. He’ll tell you, he got rid of your things because he loved you and because it hurt for him to keep them, especially after you never returned his calls. Tony you can’t let us –

“And what about the mansion? What about – “ Tony throat gets clogged and for the first time he thinks he might cry. “All my mom’s stuff. Did they sell that too?”

“No,” Steve says quietly, and the relief is stinging. “We bought it. T’challa bought it, as it is. It’s untouched.”

Tony really does want to start crying then, because at least he has a home to go to. He may not own it, and he may not ever have the money to buy it back, and sure the things within it are currently held in this strange quasi-half his, half the State’s, vacuum, but his mom’s picture won’t be gone, the oil family portrait will still hang over the fireplace, all his dad’s work and writings will still be hidden in the basement. He thinks T’challa will let him have it, and it’s all he needs. He doesn’t need ten houses and fifty sports cars, all he needs is a home to go back to.

Maybe he can get a job. Not a crazy job, not – not a CEO, or Secretary of State, or superhero. He could work in a garage, or fix people’s cars for them. Or fix computers or something. Enough to have food, clothes, pay his bills. And he could exist like that, he could happily exist like that, if the world left him alone he would leave it too. It would be okay. It could still all be okay.

And then the first voice. You don’t think that, it laughs, you don’t really think you’d be left alone? They’ll eat you alive. The press will be at your door every day, they’ll never, ever let you live alone. You will never have peace, or quiet, or a simple life, too late loser. There’s only one way you’re going to ever be alone, you know what to do, you know what to do, you know what to do –

Tony waits for a rebuttal, for some part of him to quell those fears, but no rebuttal is forthcoming, and he realises that the voice is right. It doesn’t matter what happens, he’ll never be left alone again. They’ll never give him peace again, even if he’s allowed to go back to the house, they’ll smear him and mock him in the press, and it’s not that he cares, it’s just that it means he won’t be able to live his life at all.

He feels his meds start to work. Everything becomes very muted. Steve asks if he wants to go for a walk and he smiles and nods. The voices calm themselves. Steve straps up Tony’s boots tight, changes his sweater, lets him put the parka back on and fits him with some gloves and a scarf. The meds mean this doesn’t bother Tony nearly as much as it should.

Steve talks to him as they walk but a lot of it goes over his head, he just smiles and nods, smiles and nods, smiles and nods. The leaves are a swish-crunch under his boots. The air feels bitingly cold but his coat is warm, and so are his pants. Steve tells him that Natasha bought this coat from a store that specialises in arctic wear, and Tony is glad, because he’s never warm anymore.

They reach the lake and Tony’s first thought is this would be a great place to drown myself. His second thought is that Steve and he used to come out here, Before. He remembers, after Ultron, he and Steve had both chosen this spot for the facility because back then there were going to be kids studying here and so Steve had said it would be a great place to swim in the summer.

(Tony’s school was near a lake. In his mind, Boston was always his home. He spent ages five to fifteen at Phillips, and then fifteen to twenty at MIT. If anyone ever asked him, he would always say he grew up in Boston, never New York.)

After building work was finished, and Tony officially moved in, he and Steve would come out here to sit, sometimes. Tony would bring his work, which was always so all-consuming, and Steve might paint, or, increasingly, bring work of his own. They’d pack a lunch. It was always pleasant. Tony thinks Steve is having the same thoughts as him but he doesn’t want to mention it. What he does want to do, though, is jump in. He wants to get his feet wet and swim. He wants to douse himself in the clear water surrounded by trees and red leaves and baptise himself, be reborn.

He sits and starts tugging off his shoes. The laces are tricky; his hands are still so bad, they barely respond. Steve stares at him with alarm. “What are you doing?” He barks. “Tony – “

“I just want to swim,” Tony says, scrunching his bare toes in the leaves. “I won’t be long.”

“Tony, you cannot swim in the lake.”

But Tony’s feet are already in the water. “Just a paddle then,” he says distantly, aching with a sudden intensity. He needs to be in the water, he has to be, why doesn’t Steve understand? “I won’t be long,” he says again, and starts wading in, water quickly up to his knees.

And Steve grabs his forearm, pulls him back, hard. “Are you crazy?” He breathes “What the hell do you think you’re doing?! Tony your immune system has gone to shit, if you catch a cold – “

But the skin that was in the water has warmed itself. If he could bury himself in the lake, he would be warm forever. In utero. He could live at the bottom of the lake, grow moss from his beard and have stone for hands and be happy, and alone. Why doesn’t Steve see that, why can’t he see?

Steve keeps tugging him back and Tony pulls against him, feet slipping in the mud beneath the water. “Let me go,” he manages “let me go, I need to be there.”

“Tony please,” Steve says, and his voice is a tremble; Tony didn’t realise, but Steve is crying. “Please, Tony, you’re scaring me. You’re scaring me now, come on. Let’s go home, you need to get warm.”

Tony turns and looks at Steve’s tear-soaked face. Why is he crying, what does he have to cry about? He won, he doesn’t have to worry about anything. Tony can hear the people at the bottom of the lake calling him, they want him to live there. And Tony won’t have to worry about anything, he can be safe in the mud, warm and covered and alone. So he bites Steve’s arm and Steve cries out, releasing him, so he can wade in, thick.

He slips. It’s cold, it’s really cold, and deep. He thought the water was clear, but everything has been stirred up, and now all he can see is mud and dirt and all the grit in his eyes. It’s cold, very cold and Tony can’t – he can’t remember how to swim. He kicks out wildly; there are no people at the bottom of the lake. There’s nothing warm here other than mud in his lungs. He twists, tries to find footing, but maybe there’s no ground, maybe he’s too short, or too far out, or –

Steve grabs him. Hooks an arm around his waist and pulls him free. He sits up on the ground, slaps his back until he vomits slimy green water and pushes his hair – now sticky with dirt and other things – free from his brow. Tony is shivering so hard, even his parka is cold, and he’s filthy, smelling like pond water. “I’m sorry,” he chatters, teeth grinding. “That was st-stupid. I want – I wanted – “

Steve’s hug is crushing, but warm. He presses a sloppy kiss to Tony’s temple despite the fact he smells like sewage. “It’s okay,” he breathes, rocking them both “it’s okay Tony you just – those meds, those meds will mess with you. But you’ll get better, you’ll be fine.”

It’s not that things get blurry, exactly; Tony can recall the trudge back to the compound. It’s just that he didn’t feel present for it, he felt removed, disembodied, floating. Steve sets him up in the living room on a couch and takes off all his wet things, wraps him in a large warm blanket. He sets some cocoa with marshmallows and cream down on the table even though Tony can’t drink it because of his hands. Tony pulls the blanket over his head and breathes in the musty scent. He wonders who this blanket belongs to.

***

 

There are people talking over his head. He tried to drown himself, someone says, Steve we can’t be prepared for that.

“It wasn’t – he wasn’t trying to kill himself,” Steve says, almost desperately. “He said he wanted to swim, it’s his meds, they’re screwing him all over the place. He was fine this morning, up and alert. An hour in he was practically drooling.”

“He needs help,” another voice chimes in, low and strong. “Who are we if we turn him away? What the hell are we if we do that, after everything? Where does he have to go?”

“The hospital.”

“Yeah, and what kind of life is that? If you’re going to just lock him up you might as well let him end it.”

“Bucky!”

“What? Steve you know it’s true.”

“He was happy to let you languish in a hospital,” a new voice points out. “He was happy to commit you to the system. I’m not saying – that it’s right, I’m saying that the system isn’t so bad. He’ll get the help he needs, real help, not supersoldiers who think they’re therapists because they have a therapist.”

“Watch your mouth, Barton,” the voice growls.

“It’s okay, Bucky, he’s right. We’re woefully unequipped to deal with this. Looking around – everything’s a danger. Knives, forks, scissors. The sink, he could try to drown himself in the sink, the bath. The windows need to be locked, Christ, even the sharp edge of a table would be enough.”

“What about Potts,” says a new voice. “Would she take him?”

“Good luck getting her back stateside. And Tony can’t leave the country, what, ship him off and let Potts take care of him? You might as well put the knife in his hand.”

“There must be other people,” that same voice says. “People who know him better, people who could really take care of him. Is there no family? No… no other friends?”

“There was Rhodes.”

“And there was – his bodyguard? His boxer friend, I can’t remember his name.”

“No other girlfriends, lovers? No other partners at all?”

Tony realises he must be resting next to Steve because he feels Steve stiffen. “I think – there are a few second cousins, or something. No one he’s close to.”

“Well what do we do?”

“We look after him,” Steve says simply. “We make him better, as much as we can.”

They don’t want you, the first voice begins to hiss in the back of his skull. You see? What more proof do you need, you’re a burden, a fucking burden you worm, no one wants you alive, no one wants to bother with you, think about how easy it will be for everyone when you’re just gone.

NO!, the other voice blazes, listen to Steve, listen to how much he cares about you, can’t you see how worried they all are? They just want what’s best but they don’t know how to handle it. You have to hang in there, Tony, don’t kill us. Just hang in there, you’ll see, you’ll see it’s not so bad. You have so much more to live for, so much more to do.

Tony finds himself responding. I don’t have so much more to do, he says, how can I do anything? I have no money, I’m hated. Everything I tried to fix I made worse, no one wants my help. I’m tired, I’m tired, why do you keep fighting with me I’m so tired.

***

Tony looks in the mirror and wants to throw up. His ribs stick out of his skin, his eyes are rimmed by purpling shadows. He hasn’t shaved himself in weeks, and the result is a permanent fuzz over his jaw because no one will go near him with razors.

Ugliest of all are the scars which reach up his forearm. Tony decides he will never wear a t-shirt again, not in Arizona in the heat of summer, not in the fucking desert. He never wants to see those marks again. He doesn’t need reminding of his utter lack of hope, and his complete failure to achieve even the most basic of things.

You idiot, the first voice sneers, you idiot, you idiot, you idiot, did you really think it would work? They won’t let you die they’ll never let you die this is your punishment, it’s your punishment and you have to take it like a man.

“Shut up,” Tony mutters, and he folds his sleeves down over his arms. It doesn’t matter, it doesn’t exist, it never happened. Focus on the forward. Focus on the forward, that’s what the therapist kept saying in the ward, focus on the forward, Tony, because you can’t change the past.

He tries to smooth down his hair (he needs a shower, but they won’t let him go alone, and Tony doesn’t want to put Steve in the position where he’s forced to watch) and rubs at his face to bring colour to his cheek. It doesn’t help that the only clothes they seem to give him are simple cotton numbers, big sweaters and slacks, the odd button-down. Natasha keeps saying that she will take him shopping, but such a day has failed to materialise and besides, he would be too scared to leave the compound looking like this anyway.

He’s put on weight, though, according to the scales. And every fluctuation is carefully noted down so Steve can report it to the doctors, and every pound he gains he’s a step closer to freedom. It’s been a week; maybe, maybe if he’s lucky, he might be out of here by Christmas.

Oh please, the first voice laughs, you won’t leave here, idiot. There’s only one way you get to leave here. They don’t want you, Tony, but they know how to use you, and there are still things you’re good for. Hey, maybe they’ll trot you out in front of the crowd, dress you up in a suit and use you for press tours, or get you back on those weapons. Maybe Steve will truss you up like a pony and use your ass, maybe you can be their beating boy, maybe Barnes will use you like a slave and Clint for target practice, it’s what you deserve, it’s what you deserve, it’s what you deserve –

Tony digs the groove of his nails into the palm of his hands. It’s the one thing Steve forgets, he keeps forgetting to keep Tony’s nails short. It’s not like he can really do any damage, but it quiets Them, it just – focuses him, that short spurt of not even pain, just tingles. And hey, isn’t is good for him to practice clenching his hands like that? If anyone asks, he’ll just tell them he’s trying to strengthen his grip and can’t really feel his palms anymore anyway.

It’s Steve who holds out his meds with a glass of water, helps him swallow. Tony longs for their dreariness, for their cover and the way they make the world go beautifully fuzzy at the edges. Sometimes they scare him. Most of the time, they quiet the voices and allow him to sit peacefully, reading or watching a film, or TV or whatever.

It’s Steve who buttons up his sweater and helps him step into his slippers. He helps him dress every morning, sits with him during the day, to a point where Tony has begun to wonder if he even has a job anymore. He won the war, what is he doing with it? Looking after his old invalid lover? He loves you, the second voice will whisper, oh Tony, look at how much he loves you, loves us. He never stopped, never. You always treated him so badly, Tony, you were always so dismissive or his concerns, his fears, maybe if you had listened, had talked to him about Barnes, he wouldn’t have run when you presented the Accords –

“You ready?” Steve asks, and his face is kind. Tony tries to smile, but the back of his neck is sweating, he wants to vomit. He wipes his shaking palms against his pants, tries to breathe slowly, doesn’t want to show anyone how nerve-racking this is for him, and yet –

“They’re not angry,” Steve says again “why would they be angry at you? C’mon, Tony, no one is – no one blames you for anything, nothing was your fault. They’re worried for you, we all are. Come on, let’s just get some breakfast okay?”

He’s lying, the first voice hisses, you heard them talk, you know they hate you. They mock you, they’re whispering about you behind your back, you’re their burden, their penance, make their lives easier, make your life easier, end it, end it, end it, kill yourself, do it now –

Times like this Tony wants to bash the side of his head with his fist, knock his head against the wall. The meds hook themselves down in his head and the whispers fade. Tony hates the meds, hates them, but loves that nothing matters, that he can find joy it the simplest tasks, that he no longer cares he’s a virtual prisoner with nothing to his name but regret.

Steve gently rests his hand on the small of Tony’s back and helps lead him through the sitting room. “Everyone,” he says carefully “Tony’s feeling a bit better so he’s joining us today.”

“Hi, Tony,” Natasha smiles softly. Even hazed as he is, Tony can tell she’s being extra gentle, which he might have hated once but appreciates now. “Do you want some toast?”

Tony blinks and nods. He sits at one of the chairs at the table and Steve pushes him in. He lays his hands straight on the countertop, tries to space evenly the gap between each finger, which engrosses him for a time, allows him to forget that there’s even anyone else there. He doesn’t even flinch when someone sets themselves down in the seat next to him, too focussed on the triangle shapes his fingers make.

The man leans over him to grab something, salt or sauce or whatever, and Tony reels back, blinking rapidly. Sam Wilson raises an eyebrow, but he smiles gently, in a friendly way, rests a hand on his shoulder and asks ‘are you alright?’

He’s laughing at you, he’s laughing at you, they’re all laughing at you. Mocking you, laughing at you, teasing you, what are you going to do about it? What are you going to –

Sam’s eyes are big and brown like saucers. He sees them expand, bigger and bigger, chocolate and melting, running down his face. Tony smiles, and nods. Sam smiles back, bigger. He picks apart the toast the Natasha lays in front of him, hands jittery.

“I was thinking, Tony,” Sam says, and Tony thinks he must be talking to him. “I could take you to see Rhodes, if you want. He’s unchanged, but… I don’t know. I like to think it would do him some good.”

Tony nods and smiles. “I would like that.”  
  
“Can I sit here?” Wanda asks quietly. “I’m sorry, I don’t want to disturb.”

Tony stares at her and feels… well, the drugs won’t really let him feel, but he feels shaky and ill. He wants to feel anger, because Tony has lost everything paying for Ultron’s reparations, and yet he never would have made Ultron if Wanda hadn’t forced him. He really wants to be sick, the conflict of emotions inside him stirring him up and –

She was a kid, the second voice says. She was a kid, Tony, and she was angry, and look at her, look how remorseful she is, look at what she’s had to overcome, lost her parents, her brother, her home.

Overcome? The first voice spits Look at her! She’s wearing this month’s fashions, she’s had hair dyed, she’s at college! She hasn’t overcome anything, she’s played the game, she’s played everyone, picked from obscurity because she’s a fucking nazi! Don’t you dare feel sorry for her, she despises you!

“I’m sorry,” Wanda says quietly. “I should have known, I – I’ll eat later. I’m sorry.” She gets up to move, to run, and Natasha takes her arm and pulls her back, forces her into the chair opposite Tony.

“None of us need to fear each other,” she spits. “Wanda, you need to look Tony in the eye. Tony, I’m sorry, but you need to realise we will not hurt you, not now, not ever.” Not ever again, his mind fills in.

“I’m not worried,” Tony says calmly, and it’s almost true, because with the meds it is hard to be worried. The room falls quiet, though, and Tony wonders if it’s something he said.

It’s not. It’s Barnes. He’s had his hair cut short, and he’s got a new arm except – it’s not real, it’s a prosthesis, not natural looking at all, metal poles with crinkly fingers. It seems to move well enough, but Tony wants to vomit. He blew off Bucky’s arm, didn’t he? And – he killed Tony’s parents. And – think about this logically, take deep breaths, don’t panic –

Why did Steve make him do this? Why did he make him do this, why has he made him come down here, they all hate him, hate him, hate him, Wanda smiles gently and she’s laughing at him, they’re all laughing at him, he’s going to scream, he’s going to scream at all of them, he wasn’t ready for this he isn’t ready, why did Steve have to make him he was always making him why couldn’t he just –

There are knives here, Tony. You could do it if you’re fast.

He grabs a fork and stabs it into the back of his hand and screams.

  
Steve had known, objectively, that Tony was unwell. He had ben told that, he had prepared for it. He had thought…

He had thought, stupidly, that he could make it better. Just like that. That a bit of love, companionship, hope, that all of this could fix him, make him see just how much he had to live for. He viewed Tony’s attempt to take his own life as a fluke, a one off, he imagined that Tony regretted it to no end and he would come round with some work, that he would happily go back to work and maybe even one day, come back to Steve too.

Now, though, Tony’s fingers grip his shirt, tighten so hard the buttons pop, and he can feel his hands shaking through the flimsy material. “You see?” He’s hissing “You see? I knew I wasn’t ready, I knew it. Look at what they do to me, Steve, look at what the meds are doing. Can’t you see? Can’t you see what happens to me when I take them?” He holds up the back of his hand, spotted with four red scars, perfectly circular and evenly spaced. “That isn’t normal,” he spits “this isn’t normal.”

“I’m not a doctor. Shit, Tony, I don’t know, I’m not a doctor. I don’t know what to say.”

“Did you love me?” He whispers, eyes wide, face pallid, blinking rapidly. “Did you ever love me?”

And Steve swallows, focuses. “I still do,” he says simply.

Tony lets him go with a push. “Then you – you have to let me stop taking those pills.”

“Tony.”

“The doctor doesn’t know best, the doctor doesn’t know what I need. He’s trying to make me not think, I know it. Next stop lobotomy, Steve. Every time I take them the world goes – I see things. I convince myself of bad, bad things. Steve I can get better without them, just don’t tell the doctor I’m not taking them, please. Please, I just want some of my life back, please Steve.”

“It’s not – a conspiracy,” Steve manages, which is the wrong thing to say. It belittles Tony, and he can see it in his face. “I mean – the doctor isn’t purposefully trying to stop you from thinking, you just – you’re having a bad reaction. A bad reaction, or side-effect. But if – no you’re right. You’re right, Tony, tomorrow first thing we’ll drive down to the ward and demand answers, okay? We’ll sort you out, see if you can change your dosage, anything. Anything for you, Tony.”

And Tony does seem to relent, relax. “Thank you,” he says, almost inaudible. “Thank you, for believing me.”

“It’s okay,” Steve mumbles quietly. Tony hovers in front of him for a moment, eyes flicking to his. Steve finds himself reaching out, placing a hand on Tony’s shoulder, then cheek. And then he pulls him close, hugs him hard. “It’s okay,” he says again “it can still be okay.”

“You don’t know that,” Tony whispers “you don’t know what it’s like in my head.”

“I know that you’re a genius. I know you used to be happy. I know – “ what, Steve, what, that he still has it in him? Why don’t you think before you fucking speak, he tried to kill himself, he’s not going to get better overnight just because you get down on one knee and tell him you love him.

“You know?”

“I know that, with time, and the right help, and patience, you can get better.”

Tony curls his head into Steve’s shoulder. It surprises him; a few days ago, he was afraid that Tony wanted him dead, that he hated him for what he did, resented his presence. Now, though, he tightens his grip. “Do you really still love me?” He asks.

“I do.”

“Why?”

“I never stopped.”

“Not true. If you loved me, you would have – helped me.”

“Wanting to help my friend doesn’t mean I stopped loving you, or that I loved him more.”

“It does if it means leading a war against me. If it means I end up charged for a crime a girl you’re protecting made me do while she sits at dinner in her fancy new clothes and attends college.”

“Is Wanda a problem? I can move Wanda, Wanda can move. I’ll send her to New York, it’ll be nice for her to live in the city. She can go, you don’t have to share any space with her that you don’t want to,” Steve says immediately. “Tony I want you to get better.”

“And Barnes?” Tony asks. “If I told you to send him away?”

Steve pauses for a beat. “I would remind you,” he says, very very gently, “that Bucky is… not well. Just as much as you are not well.”

Tony crumples. He sits on the side of the bed, hands over his face, shoulders tight and – his mouth pressed into a line, breathing heavy, a low whine at the back of his throat which means –

“Don’t cry,” Steve blurts, and he kneels down, rubs at Tony’s knees, tries to prise his hands from his face yet still avoid the scars. “Shit please, Tony, don’t cry. Don’t. I can’t make Bucky leave but – but we can. I swear, as soon as you’ve put on some weight, as soon as you feel better, we’ll go. We can go anywhere you want, just you and me, alone. Just us, Tony, sweetheart, it’ll just be us.”

Steve doesn’t know if he’s lying or not. He wants to, he thinks, that’s what he wants. To closet Tony away, heal him, glaze over his scars and wrap him in love. He’s also intensely aware that he fought a war so he could have the right to live and work, and it doesn’t exactly look good to up and leave after all is said and done. But Tony rubs at his nose, sniffs, dries his eyes with shaky hands. “You mean that?” He croaks “We can leave?”

“I promise.”

“Even after everything? You would do that, for me.” And Tony sounds so disbelieving it hurts, it doubles Steve’s resolve.

“Yes,” he near hisses in response “yes, Tony, don’t you understand? I have Bucky, and Bucky is safe, and that’s all I wanted. That’s all I wanted for him. But I never stopped loving you, and I never stopped – hoping. I never…” Steve trails off. He pauses, collects himself; clears his throat.

“Three days,” he says “we’ll stop the meds for three days, and we’ll see what happens, okay? This is crazy, I know, it’s stupid, but – if you really think they’re making you worse, then I’ll take your word for it. But Tony, if you start – spiralling, if bad things start happening, I’m calling the doctor straight away, okay? And you will have to submit to whatever treatment he thinks is going to work, because – you need to get better. We can’t go if you’re not better,” and Steve hates himself for waving that in Tony’s face, for holding it up as a goal. It feels wrong, demeaning. And yet.

Tony nods, though. “Thank you,” he croaks. “That’s all I ask for. A little bit – a little bit of trust, you know? It helps.”

A lull. “How’s the hand?” Steve asks.

“Better. Fine. Barely felt it.”

“Tony…”

“I want to sleep now, Steve.”

“We could go for a walk?”

“No. I’m tired. It’s – tiring, all of this.”

Steve nods. “Yeah, yeah I know.”

“Do you?”

“I – you get what I mean, Tony.”

Tony just shrugs. He hangs there, as if waiting for Steve to give him permission to leave. “I’m going to sleep,” he repeats.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> comments! are! my! everything!
> 
> but yeah. uh it gets a lot worse before it gets better. tell me ur thoughts.


	3. Chapter 3

And Tony does sleep. He sleeps all day, and all night, and in the morning he doesn’t get out of bed at all.

Steve hangs there, like a bad smell, and tries to encourage him to leave. But Tony doesn’t even respond, doesn’t give any inclination that he’s heard at all, and instead just rolls, faces the wall, curves the blanket tighter over his shoulders.

He doesn’t eat, or drink. When Steve snaps, breaks his promise, and tries to get him to take his pills he resolutely shuts his mouth, shuts his eyes, won’t listen to a thing Steve asks. He doesn’t leave the bed at all, not even for toilet breaks, and that’s when Steve finds himself dialling the clinic. Two days down, each spent in bed, Tony not responding to him, to Natasha, certainly not to anyone else, and there’s a doctor asking him calmly if it was too soon, and if Steve would prefer to have Tony committed once more.

It seems too cruel. To give Tony a lease on life – no matter how small – and then rip it away once more. Send him back to a room with no comforts, no one to visit, let him waste away. Because Steve knows, with a sort of aching urgency, that Tony won’t get better if he’s left that way. He knows that, if Tony is committed now, he might never come out again. There will never be a point at which he is prepared to face life on his own. He can’t do that. He can’t let that happen. Not to Tony. And not because of him.

In the end, it takes both himself and Natasha to peel Tony out of bed. They sit him in the bath and clean him as best they can, and – and Tony doesn’t respond at all, doesn’t say anything, just lolls in their hands, unable or unwilling to hold himself up at all. They cut his nails and hair, dress him in fresh clothes, sit him at the table and force him to eat oatmeal; Steve holds open his jaw, Natasha spoons it in, and they don’t stop until he’s eaten the whole bowl, three times a day.

It’s arduous. They are making Tony live. They are moving his body for him. Without medication, Tony appears to be unable to function, and yet Steve can’t understand why. He understands depression, God, does he understand depression, but this is unlike anything he’s ever seen; this is madness, or worse. How can Tony be living, breathing, talking, one minute and non-responsive the next? What triggers a change like that? It can’t all be the medication, can it?

Five days after the start of Tony’s major depressive episode, Sam and Steve pack him into the back of a car. He doesn’t ask where they’re going, just rests his head against the window and watches his breath fog the glass. Their first stop is the clinic; the psychiatrist sits with Tony and asks him questions about how his meds made him feel, why he wanted to stop taking them, what are the side effects, and why won’t he get out of bed. Tony answers, barely; most are to the vein of ‘I want to die’.

So the doctor changes his dosage. Says that this is wrong, it’s bad, and that really Tony needs to be brought back in. Steve insists he can handle him. The doctor doesn’t say anything, because he knows Tony’s situation.

Their next stop is the hospital.

This appears to peak Tony’s interest, if only mildly. “What are we doing here?” He asks, voice throaty with disuse.

“We thought you might like to see Rhodey,” Sam says, measured. He won’t meet Tony’s eyes in the rearview mirror.

Tony blinks. “Now?” He croaks “Looking like this?”

“You look fine,” Steve assures, which is technically true by Tony’s new standard.

“There are people in there,” Tony mutters, and his voice is tight, he’s folded in on himself. “I’m not – I can’t.”

“You said you wanted to see him.”

“I was high,” Tony spits “I was – thinking, I don’t know, maybe it would be less busy, or – I’m not going in there. I’m not leaving the car.”

Sam and Steve share a look, and then Tony starts shaking apart in the back seat.

He’s tucked his head between his knees, hands gripping his hair as tight as they can (subversively, Steve notes that Tony’s physio must be going well), and makes this low, groaning noise from behind clenched teeth. Steve twists, reaches out a hand, and Tony snaps, starts kicking the back of Sam’s chair over, and over, and over. Sam cries ‘watch that!’ but Tony keeps kicking, balling up a mixture of rage and panic and throwing it out through his feet and into the passenger seat.

“Calm down,” Steve manages, but he sounds panicked himself. “Look, we’re leaving. See? I’m leaving. I’m driving away, here. We’ll come back another day, it’s fine, it’s fine Tony, it’s okay.”

Tony has one hand braced on the seat, the other in the shape of a fist crashing against the window. “You never listen,” he’s breathing “you never listen, you never listen, you never, ever listen to me, why don’t you listen, why don’t you listen, I just want to go home, I’m tired, I’m tired, I’m tired, I’m – “

This goes on for a time. Nothing Steve says can calm him down. Eventually, at some point in the two hour drive, Tony does fall asleep. His knuckles are bloodied.

  
Tony’s new meds have the desired – if strange – effect. He gets out of bed in the morning. He eats his breakfast. He smiles too much, and too broad. He joins conversations at inopportune moments, sometimes talking about something else entirely. Other than that, he sits alone, talking to himself about whatever it is he’s reading, or watching.

It’s not ideal.

With this new medication, Tony’s moods oscillate wildly. God fucking forgive him, but even Steve’s fuse begins to grow short. One moment Tony is laughing, the next he’s sobbing, then ten minutes later he’s ripping out the pages from Steve’s books and using them to clog all the sinks he can find.

“You’re unprepared,” Sam mutters, one morning. “You didn’t expect this.”

And Steve is forced to admit, no, he hadn’t. He had known Tony was mentally ill. He hadn’t known he was insane.

  
It’s Bucky’s idea, actually. Bucky mentions it because he’d always wanted a dog, but was allergic. Steve remembers this well from when they were kids; allergic was probably putting it mildly. Bucky could cough himself into a vomiting fit if around loose hair for too long, and although he loved dogs (still does), it was just never feasible. The same way that despite everything the serum’s done for Steve, he can’t seem to shake hayfever, Bucky never got over his old allergy, and so had to decline the donation of a new puppy that the veterens society had tried to donate.

Steve figures Tony doesn’t need a dog that will calm him down, necessarily. He thinks it would be better if Tony just had something to do. The workshop is off limits, and there’s only so much TV, so many books, you can watch and read before it grows tiresome. A dog means daily walks, and training, and someone to keep living for. That is, if it works. Chances are, Tony could look at the dog and tell Steve to dump it in a trash can.

This time, only Steve drives Tony, and he takes the passenger seat. He doesn’t ask where they’re going, but Steve emphasises that they’re going to a kennel to pick a dog and if Tony doesn’t want to that’s fine, but Steve has always liked a dog, and so he’d like Tony’s help picking one. Tony rolls his head, glares at him.

“I’m not a kid,” he says bluntly. “Fucked up, yes, but not a child. Don’t talk to me like that.”

So they drive in silence the rest of the way.

The girl who shows them around is young, chirpy. Tony seems to disappear into his hoodie, hands buried in the pocket and large, swarthy grey material swamping him. She shows them puppies, and Steve asks Tony which one he likes. He suggests one, and then another, and Tony just shrugs, kicks his feet against the dusty concrete ground.

“We have more,” the girl asks “if maybe a puppy isn’t your thing? Usually they go so fast… but we have more mature dogs too!”

So she takes them to where the cast-offs are kept. Big, slobbering dogs, fat small ones, dogs that people don’t generally choose unless wanting to look charitable. Dogs missing an eye, a leg, dogs with permanent limps.

Tony points. “I want that one.”

The dog’s colouring is dark, almost black with brown patches for eyebrows and a white crest on it’s chest. It’s big, probably up to Tony’s mid thigh. And it’s sleeping, stretched out on a bed, chest rising and falling slowly.

“What breed?” Steve asks.

The girl shrugs. “We can never be sure,” she says “he was found on the streets. He’s big, and has the colouring, so we thought maybe something mixed with a St Bernard? Or maybe Bernese? One of those mixed with a Labrador, or Retriever. He’s so gentle, you know?”

“How old is he?”

“Probably six. But mixed dogs live longer,” she’s quick to point out “and he’s perfectly healthy.”

Steve turns to Tony. “You sure?” He asks, almost cautiously hopeful. “We can’t bring him back if we don’t like him.” And by that, he clearly means, if you don’t take care of him and leave him to starve while you lie in bed.

Tony nods rapidly, stares at his shoes. “That one,” he mutters, fast. He keeps scuffing his shoe against the ground.

Steve turns to the girl. “This one,” he repeats. “Does he have a name?”

“We’ve been calling him Thor but – “ the girl blushes slightly. “I don’t know. You might want to change that.”

Steve smiles at that. There is an air of Thor around the dog, big and bulky with his long haired plume. He seems regal, loyal – like Thor, wherever he is.

“He’s cut,” the girl is saying “and he’s nicely trained – knows your basic sit stay come. We know he must have had a family before, because he’s just so good with children, but they found him wandering the streets after – “ and the girl cuts short, tactfully. Steve and Tony both know what she’s going to say: after New York.

Steve buys a new collar, and lead, and harness. He buys good dog food and two bowls. He forgoes a coat (the dog looks built for snow) and purchases a select of chew toys and tennis balls.

Then, he pushes the lead into Tony’s hand, signs some papers. “Just like when you picked me up from the ward,” Tony dead-pans.

Steve doesn’t grace that with an answer. “What do you want to call him?” He asks.

“Mosely.”

“Any particular reason?”

“He looks like a Mosely.”

Steve examines the dog. One ear that flaps, another that sticks up straight. Pallid blue eyes, a bright pink tongue. Brown fur with white tuffs, white socks on it’s feet. Yeah, he thinks, yeah he does look a bit like a Mosely.

  
“I want a new physiotherapist,” Tony says one morning without preamble.

Steve blinks, and looks up. Mosely rests his chin on Tony’s leg. “Why?” He asks, slowly.

“Sometimes – he touches me.”

Steve stares. “What?”

“I mean – when I’m not… responsive. He touches me.”

“Touches you how?”

“I think you know how.”

Steve wants to scream. He wants to scream at the therapist, and then at Tony, for sitting there, for just taking it, and never saying a word. “How long has this been going on?” Steve manages, measuredly.

“Since the start. He was always very… touchy feely. After I went off my meds – when I got difficult. He got a bit more bold. I’m just saying, if it’s okay, I’d like to get a new one.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

Tony shrugs. “I didn’t really care.”

Steve should be elated, then. He should be over the moon that now, Tony does care. That he’s regained enough possession of his mind and body to feel wrong when he’s invaded. He should be glad. “Do I – Tony, when you say touch…”

“I mean touch. That’s all. It’s not a big deal, you don’t need to make a scene. Just sack him and get someone else.”

“Tony,” Steve says, and he rests his book on the couch “listen to me. You can’t let this happen again. You have to tell me about things like this, I can’t – I know you want peace and quiet. I know that, so I won’t call the cops, okay? I’ll have him blacklisted and drop a line to the hospital but – you need to tell me. Please. Tell me so I can help you.”

Tony looks mildly irritated, the way he always does when Steve launches into a monologue. “Sure,” he says. Steve doesn’t think he means it.

  
Steve hires a woman. He doubts there will be any other incidents like the one before, but there’s a part of his brain that just tells him hiring another man will be the wrong thing to do. She’s Irish, she’s lived in the USA for ten years, and she always greets Tony with a “and how are we doing today, Mr Stark?”

She’s the right mix of chirpy and reserved. She talks, which means Tony doesn’t have to, and if that makes him comfortable then, well, that’s best. Tony keeps a wide berth from the rest of the team; upon meeting Bucky in the hallway, his response is to look the other way. Steve doesn’t mind, because for all intents and purposes, Tony is getting better. He wakes in the mornings to walk Mosely, long, meandering things, which – while always in view of the compound – he’s allowed to take alone, trusted. Sometimes, he’ll discuss whatever he’s reading with Natasha, tentative at first, and then long talks which digress into heated argument. His moods appear to balance out. He even puts on weight.

And then, on any given morning, he suddenly can’t bring himself to leave his bed. Mosely wraps himself up across his legs, and Tony will stare vacantly at a wall. These episodes never last more than two days, but but every time they occur is a reminder that Tony is still ill, that there’s no quick cure, that this could go on for the rest of his life if unchecked.

It’s dampening, to say the least.

  
“And how are we today, Mr Stark?”

Tony smiles and lets Sarah’s words smooth over him, mixing like thick syrup in a warm drink. She talks about her mother and father back home, she talks about her brother in Canada and her two nephews. She always steers clear of current events, something that marks her as far more astute than her ramblings would suggest, and can happily pass the hour while Tony squeezes his hands into fists and struggles to write his name.

“How old are you?” Tony asks abruptly one morning.

“That’s not polite, Mr Stark.”

“But really though.”

“Thirty-two.”

Tony smiles, secretly. “You’re a kid,” he says.

“At thirty-two? You really think so?”

“Sure. You have your whole life ahead of you. You haven’t even settled down yet.”

“Neither have you,” Sarah remarks, almost defensively.

“Yeah but I’m…” Tony thinks of Steve, way back when. That seems like decades ago. His whole life feels gelatinous, stretched out like glue. The long years of his childhood, then youth, all the way up to cave. None of that feels real. And then these last ten years…

“I’m a special case,” Tony settles. “I was busy.”

“And I’m not?”

Tony, the second voice says. You’re about to be very rude to the nice lady. Why don’t you dial back a bit?

You’re a fucking asshole, you know that? The first voice spits. This is why people can’t take you, Tony. You say shit like this. What are you getting at, that she should be married? Or that she’s too ugly to be married? Or that all women have to settle down? Christ after all the lawsuits have you learnt nothing you stupid wasting sack of –

Tony shrugs. “You just seem like the type. The way you talk about your family, I’d think you’d like your own. That’s all.”

Nice save.

Sarah mellows. “Sure,” she says “one day. I had my hands full, the first ten years. Had to start again over here. It’s difficult.”

“Your parents couldn’t help?”

Sarah sighs. “They just didn’t have the money.”

Tony appreciates that she doesn’t deride him thinking that every set of parents has enough money to support their kids. Instead, she tells him to set aside the stress balls and pick up a pen. “Draw a picture,” she says. “Start with something simple – let’s see if we can work on those lines.”

  
Sarah’s sessions are the highlight of Tony’s day. An hour, no matter how brief, or taxing, spent away from the rest of them, without the weight of Steve’s desperate hope and everyone else’s judging stares. It’s just nice to talk to someone who isn’t a – superperson. Who isn’t wrapped up in the running of the world, but instead worries about what they’re going to have for dinner, and their father’s poor health, and what they should do for Christmas.

You fucking patronising bastard, the first voice hisses. He has less pull these days, Tony thinks. The urge to kill himself has lessened. Oh, he’s unhappy, sure. But he’s less inclined to end it. He sees now that there is a potential for life outside of this compound. Even if he never leaves, he takes enjoyment now from simple things: Mosely, walking him in the mornings, his chats with Sarah and the books he reads. He thinks he might just hold on awhile, see how life goes.

Christmas, unfortunately, is rapidly approaching. It’s two months. Tony has not yet visited Rhodey in the hospital, nor has he called Pepper. She also hasn’t called him, not once. Tony knows that his attempted suicide was pretty widely reported, and he knows Pepper isn’t cruel. He figures she must be going something of her own, and decides to let that be.

Cut the crap, the first voice says. She never loved you, Tony. Money money money, look what you did for her! Secretary to CEO, you practically bought her everything she owns! There’s only one thing Pepper ever wanted, Tony, and it wasn’t you with your ugly face. She found you just as irritating as the rest of them did –

Don’t listen, the second voice responds. Tony – she loved us. You know that, I don’t have to explain it, do I? But too much too soon, and Pepper is only human. Give her time: she will call, one day.

But she doesn’t. And the days start to get colder and colder. Tony’s morning walks now take place in the dark, but he doesn’t mind. It’s always so silent. His breath will fog the air. The orange lights which illuminate the grounds send spiralling shadows, and he’s warm in his coat.

One morning, he wakes up and finds the whole compound covered in snow. For the first time in a long time, without realising it, he is eager to wake up. He wraps up warm, doesn’t bother with a leash, and sets Mosely wild on the snow. He rolls and jumps and sinks in a few places, but for the most part Tony can see that he fucking loves it, and that makes Tony smile too.

He’s worn out when he gets back – he’d had to chase Mosely down on a few occasions – and so goes straight to the study where he knows Sarah will probably already be waiting with a coffee Steve has made her. There are two cups today, and Sarah is smiling. “I figured you’d be cold,” she said. “If you can pick it up with both hands there’ll be extra cream.”

“What a taskmaster.”

“Hmm,” Sarah says, and she’s sipping her coffee. There’s a dot of cream on her nose that Tony, for some reason, can’t bring himself to point out. “Yeah, well – I’m trying to pavlovion condition you.” She flicks some snow off the table where Tony had dragged it in. “And did Mosely have a grand time today?”

“I think he misses the snow.”

“He must. He looks built for it,” and she absent-mindedly strokes the top of Mosely’s head until he curls at their feet. “Anyway,” she says “back to work.”

  
Tony manages to draw a square. It’s probably the closest he’s come to drawing a line without wiggles. Once, Tony was known for his steady hands. He could draw schematics without rule, dead straight, even while roaring drunk (because it came in handy more than once.) Now he struggles to write his name. It’s not a bad thing, necessarily; it’s not like Tony will ever need to sign anything important ever again.

At the end of the hour, when Sarah is ready to leave, she asks if Mosely likes to play fetch. Tony admits he doesn’t know, because he doesn’t like anyone else walking him, and he can’t really throw and catch a ball with his hands the way they are.

“Then tomorrow I’ll come later,” she says. “We’ll take Mosely out, try some throwing and catching. That is, if you’re up for it?”

Tony shrugs. He’s pleasantly surprised. “Sure,” he says “I mean – you should check with Steve.”

“Do you really think he’ll say no?”

This makes Tony uneasy. No, he doesn’t think so. Why would Steve stop him? Because look at everything he’s done for you, the first voice is sneering. Paid for all your medication, put up with all your ranting and raving, you wouldn’t even have Mosely if not for him, and now you go off with –

Go off with who?

You know what you’re doing.

“Tony?” Sarah prompts, and she sounds cautious. “Are you – here, do you need to sit?”

Tony, stop. You’re allowed to have friends. You’re allowed to have friends who aren’t Steve. Look, Sarah likes you. She does like us, Tony. Why else would she want to go for a walk? You think she does that with all her patients?

Hah, the first voice sneers in return. Just someone else who needs to be paid to spend time with you.

Would Steve want this? Would he want you to just live the rest of your life here, with no one or nothing but him? Please, Tony you know that’s crazy. Pepper is gone, Rhodey is – he might not ever come back. You need friends, and this is harmless. It’s good for you, this is good for you. Steve would never mind, he would encourage it.

“Tony?” Sarah asks once more. “Sweetie I can’t – I don’t know what to do if you don’t respond.”

And Tony jolts, back down to earth, into his body. He blinks, stares up at Sarah and – he can’t remember sitting down. “I’m sorry,” he says, trying to adjust. “I – what was the question?”

“Tomorrow. Hold off on the walk and we’ll go together. Get to work on some of that ball throwing technique, hey?”

Tony nods. “Yes, yeah. Definitely. Thanks, Sarah.”

“It’s no problem,” she says easily, and scratches Mosely between the ears. “He’s worrying,” she says “you should give him some attention.”

  
It’s strange, lying in. Because usually he would be out of bed by now, but… but this doesn’t feel like depression. It doesn’t feel like he’s lying in because he can’t bear the thought of living for nothing. It’s the same kind of lie in he would have on Sunday mornings with Steve, way back when, when they were –

Lovers.

Now, Mosely rests his chin on Tony’s chest while he absent-mindedly scratches behind his ears. Despite not having to be up by half nine, he doesn’t think he’ll be able to get back to sleep. He rolls and checks the alarm; 06:12, 18th of December.

The date draws him up short. How did he miss this? Was he just not – thinking? Well, yes, clearly. But the 18th, that’s only a day before –

Tomorrow is the day his mother died.

Usually he would go the grave and lay flowers, but how can he now? Fuck, God he can’t ask Steve. He doesn’t know how he could broach it, and even if there wasn’t all this bad blood… he wouldn’t want to. He wants it to be private, solitary, and he doesn’t want or need Steve’s pressing guilt cloying him up the whole way there and back.

So when Sarah arrives, promptly, she can see Tony is agitated. It’s not that his hands are shaking more than usual, but he’s distracted enough that he keeps missing the ball. Mosely, at least, has a good time. Sarah is a good throw, and he loves bounding off into the snow, disappearing, and then shoving his head out, tongue wagging, ear flopping, ball held victoriously in his mouth.

“I need – to ask you a favour,” Tony manages at the end of the walk.

“Anything,” Sarah says easily. “What can I do for you?”

“Tomorrow is – it’s the day – it’s the day I would usually go to my parent’s grave,” Tony gets out, wincing. The air is sharp around his cheeks, and it’s just started to snow.

Sarah takes this in for a moment, processes. “Is tomorrow – sorry, but tomorrow – is it the anniversary?”

Tony nods. “I can’t – ask Steve,” he says awkwardly. “It’s a long story, but – I can’t do that to him, after everything he’s done for me. It’s bad enough in there without – I don’t want to make it a big deal, understand? But I would really – I would feel shit if I missed it. I can’t miss it. I don’t know if – you’re working, if you are I understand and I’ll figure something out, it only has to be for ten minutes or so. I mean I know the drive is long but – you know what forget it, it’s fine. I can go a whole year without visiting, what makes this day so special, I’ll go another – “

“It’s fine, Tony,” Sarah says gently. “I live in the city. I can take you in after our session and drive you back.”

“That means – “ Tony does the quick, easy math. “Two hours here, two hours back, two hours back here again, and then another two hours home. You can’t – I can’t ask you to do that.”

It’s because you’re fucking selfish Tony. You don’t think of anyone but yourself.

“It’s not a problem, Tony. Stop thinking it’s a problem. I don’t have any other clients tomorrow, it’s fine. I mean – “ Tony notes the Sarah’s accent is especially thick when she’s nervous “ – will you be okay? In the city?”

“I need to see the graves,” is all Tony can say. “I need to be there.”

Sarah nods, because she understands. “Okay,” she says “okay. Be ready to leave after the session. Bring Mosely, if you want.”

  
Steve hadn’t paid much attention to Tony’s physiotherapist. She’s short, maybe, by Steve’s standards; just a little under Tony. Thick, curly black hair and a very pale complexion, with a strong nose. That’s about all Steve had noted, other than she looked kind and spoke fast.

Now, she’s talking about taking Tony out tomorrow. She says she understand it’s the anniversary of his parent’s death (Steve curses himself for forgetting) and he wants to visit the graves. She says she’s more than happy to drive him, since it’s on the way, and she’ll happily drive him back too.

Steve offers to pay her, and she sounds mildly irritated. She takes a tone that reminds him of his mother: “No, thank you,” she says curtly, voice sharp. “I don’t need payment to give a friend a lift.”

“I can pick him up, after, if it’s easier for you?”

“Mr Rogers, I feel like I’m speaking to a brick wall. You and Tony both seem to have trouble understanding that this is not a problem for me at all and I am more than willing to help. Understand that Tony is good company and its no trouble to give him a lift.”

“I don’t – think he’s not good company. I think what you see of him, for an hour of each day, is not the Tony – he can be difficult,” Steve gets out, eventually. “I don’t mean this to patronise him or you, but especially with something like seeing the graves. He’ll be angry, and upset. He’s better, but his moods can still go south. Miss Donnelly, I’m just trying to give you some warning that you’ll be responsible for him and, God, look there’s a very real chance he might try to step in front of a car.”

Sarah is silent for a moment. “I’ll take care of him, Mr Rogers,” she says very softly. “You can be sure about that.”

  
The snow eases up for the drive. Sarah is mostly silent on the way to New York, but she puts on the radio, lets mellow Christmas songs play through the speakers.

“Are you happy there?” She asks abruptly. Tony is jerked from his reverie.

“What?”

“Back there, in the compound. Are you happy?”

“I’m – “ Tony gives an uneasy laugh. “I’m never happy, Sarah.”

She sighs. “But as far as you can be, I mean – would you be happier somewhere else?”

Tony shrugs, looks out his window. “There’s nowhere else for me to go.”

“You couldn’t… move out? On your own?”

“I have no money.”

“Then get a job.”

“I can’t. I can’t do that.”

“Why not?”

“I can’t – you don’t understand,” Tony mutters. “I can’t work – out there. People would – I can’t have that life. I want it, God, do I want it. But it won’t happen for me now, not after everything I’ve done.”

A long silence. “What is it you think you’ve done?” Sarah asks gently.

Tony has to turn his head away. There are tears burning the corners of his eyes. “I don’t want – “ he manages before his throat chokes up. “Can’t talk about this now.”

“I’m sorry,” Sarah says quietly.

They don’t talk for the rest of the journey.

New York hasn’t changed, not at all. The streets are still busy, people still live their lives. Tony had forgotten; how self-centred is that? But hidden away in the facility, he had forgotten that ordinary people live ordinary lives, that life goes on, that somewhere people still dance in clubs and drink fine wine and worry about taxes.

He wishes he could be one of them.

“I didn’t realise you were catholic,” Sarah says, with just a hint of hidden happiness. It hadn’t occurred to Tony that religion was something she cared for.

“I’m not. My mom was. My dad… wasn’t. But he agreed to be buried here, to make her happy.”

“That’s very kind of him. I always thought he would be the kind to stick to his guns on something like religion.”

“He was,” Tony says. “He was gruff, and pretty hardgoing on all of us. But my mom had a way around him, and – he wanted to make her happy.”

“They must have been married a long time.”

“Yeah,” is all Tony says “they were.”

There are a few other people milling around, laying flowers, saying prayers. Tony pulls his beanie hat down firm over his head, keeps his eyes trained on the ground. He moves quickly, keeping his pace firm. Last year, when he came here, he’d had a driver with him. And there had been press following him, wanting to get his reaction. And they had played the clip over and over on the news that night, talking about how Barnes had killed his parents and what this meant for the Avenger’s amnesty.

Now, Tony can stand in peace.

After, Sarah drives him back in silence. He’s tired anyway. She says she’ll be back in two days time to start therapy again.

“I was wondering,” she sighs, before she turns to leave. “I’m not — I don’t have anyone. No family here, I mean. I can’t afford to see my brother, or go home, so I was thinking — hey, why don’t you come for Christmas.”

Tony blinks. “What?”

“For Christmas. Unless — I understand if you want to spend it here, you know. They’re your friends. It’s just you mentioned that you don’t — like it, exactly, and — “

“Yes,” Tony says quickly. “Yes, yeah. Thank you.”

Sarah looks pleased. “I guess you’ll have to check with Steve. I can call — “

“I’ll talk to him,” Tony says dismissively. He clears his throat, realising he probably looks a little too eager. “I’ll talk to him,” he repeats, slowly. “It’ll be fine.”

  
“For Christmas?”

Tony is looking at Steve with a look akin to exasperation and longing. “Yeah,” he says “Christmas. The 25th.”

“I know when Christmas is.”

“And?”

“And — and are you sure? You want to go.”

Tony’s brow furrows. “It’s just a meal. With a friend. In an apartment. What do you think’s going to happen?”

“I don’t know, I mean — you remember the hospital.”

Tony doesn’t, really. He thinks Steve might have tried to take him to see Rhodey, and Tony might have — sounded off, a little, in the back of the car. “But I was in New York today. I was actually in the city.”

“How was it?”

Tony shrugs. “It was fine. Look, if you don’t want me to go — “

“No!” Steve blusters “No, no, I — I want you to go. I mean, I want you to do what you want. Yeah, of course you can. It’s not like — I’m your keeper, or whatever, I can’t actually tell you what to do.”

“Except you can, really.”

“Yeah, but only when it’s hurting you,” Steve says gently. “And you know that.”

That’s so benevolent, Tony thinks internally. He shakes the thought, pushes it down; Steve has been kind to him, hasn’t he.

Hasn’t he?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yh poor tony
> 
> per usual, i love comments, whatever u can! a few ppl asked abt the omega story from the snippets and i should have a chapter out soon, but i've rewritten it, like, completely,
> 
> but yh, comments are loved!


	4. Chapter 4

It’s Steve who takes the call. Tony is walking with Mosely, and he doesn’t have his own cell. Sarah calls, direct to Steve.

“Hello?” She says, harried. “Captain? I need to talk to Tony, it’s urgent.”

“He’s out, walking.”

“He couldn’t have gone far,” she snaps. “Bring him back.”

“Are you in a rush?”

“I’m at the airport. I need to talk to him, now.”

“I — I can run?”

“Crap, there’s not enough — okay. Okay Steven, I need you to do me a favour. Tell Tony that I’m sorry, but Christmas is cancelled.”

“Oh. Okay. Why — “

“My dad is sick, he might not make it, I’m going home and I’m spending Christmas with my mother. Tell Tony I will be back eventually, but I don’t know when. It could be awhile, maybe. Tell him I’m — not leaving him, at all. Make sure he does his exercises, make sure keeps busy. Tell him I’ll be in touch soon. I haven’t got much time, but — tell him I’m coming back. I promise. Captain? Make sure you tell him that, let him know.”

“I — Jesus, Sarah, I’m sorry. Yeah, I will. I’ll tell him.”

“Good. Don’t forget. And don’t leave it, either, I don’t want him to — I have to go. Tell him bye, and I miss him already.”

Steve feels something strike cold his belly. “Yeah,” he says “I’ll — “

She’s gone.

Steve holds the phone to his ear for a long time. He doesn’t know why he’s — what is this, jealousy? Tony is allowed friends, he’s allowed friends outside of this corrupt, hyper-dependant team. It’s good, it’s healthy, and Sarah is a lovely girl.

Friends. They’re friends.

(What if they’re more?)

It shouldn’t matter. He and Tony are done. Even if Tony felt the same way as him, it would… be wrong. To initiate that, with a man who so clearly doesn’t know what he wants, who would do anything, unpredictable.

Still, Steve thinks he had held hopes. Secretly, in his heart. Which is why it’s Tony who approaches him on Christmas Eve.

“Sarah,” Tony croaks. “She hasn’t — been recently. Did she say anything to you or…”

Steve chews the inside of his cheek. “Yeah,” he says. “She did.”

Tony stares at him. “What?” He whispers. “Is it something I did?”

“No,” Steve says carefully. Sarah is going to be gone indefinitely, perhaps forever. Tony — Tony does not look ready to hear this. “No. Said she’s going on holiday, but that she would be back soon.”

“Oh,” Tony mumbles. He rubs a spot above his left eyebrow with his shirt sleeve clenched in his fist. “She never mentioned…”

“There’s probably a lot she doesn’t mention.”

“Yeah,” Tony nods “yeah probably. I’m just — a client, you know. So she wouldn’t tell me everything. That’s why I — “ Tony clears his throat, starts to shuffle away. “Okay,” he’s saying “that’s okay.”

“Wait,” Steve blurts, reaching out. “She said — she said her dad is ill, Tony.”

“Has she gone to help him?”

“Honestly… she said she didn’t know when she would be back. I’m sorry, I’m not going to — lie to you, or hold back anything because — whatever, I’ve seen what happens when I try to do that. She said she doesn’t know when she’ll be back.”

Tony nods, processing this. “Okay,” he says. “Well, that makes sense I guess. That’s better, than knowing — I don’t know,” Tony laughs slightly “that she had just — left, or something. That would suck. So I guess — Christmas here then?”

“Christmas here.”

“I hope you’re not expecting a present.”

“I would never.”

  
Steve gets Tony some books, and a new collar for Mosely. He didn’t want to be extravagant, not when that was something Tony used to love doing.

But at Christmas, Tony just sips dolefully from his wine. He’s barely touched dinner, and he’s feeding his lamb to Mosely. “You shouldn’t be here,” he mutters eventually. “I’m bringing you down.”

“Huh?”

“Go and have fun, Steve. It’s Christmas.”

“And leave you?”

“Yes.”

“No.”

“Don’t be stubborn.”

“I want to sit with you.”

“Why?” Tony asks, irked. “Is it my fantastic conversation? We’re not together, Steve. You don’t love me, Steve. You don’t owe me your pity, and I don’t want you breathing down my neck. So fuck off and go and have fun like I know you want to.”

“I — “ what can Steve say? He wants to be here. In his head, he had thought — he doesn’t know. That Tony would have mellowed by Christmas. That he would be better. That there would be a chance of —

“Do you remember? The last Christmas?”

“What, last year? I was drunk.”

“No, the year before. I mean — really, the last Christmas.”

Tony looks away. “I don’t want to,” he mutters.

“Why not?”

“Because I was happy. I was so happy.” Tony turns back, and his eyes are glazed, either with the need to send himself away or the border of tears. “I thought I had everything.”

“Didn’t you?”

“Well, no.” And Tony smiles, actually smiles, one of those sardonic lip quirks he used to dole out by the dozen. “Obviously I didn’t.”

He sips his wine, and Steve’s brow furrows. “I don’t follow.”

“I know,” Tony says. “And that’s good. I like you that way. You’re still so fucking — innocent. I don’t know what would have to happen to corrupt you. Things are simple for you, old friend comes back, help old friend, one track mind. You always had a one track mind.”

“I’m not a fucking idiot, Tony. Don’t talk to me like one.” In hindsight, this is something that always bothered Steve. Without realising it, Tony could do this, talk down like this. It used to drive him crazy.

“Yeah well — you can be sometimes, you know that? Steve? You can be an idiot. I was an idiot too, when I was thirty. We all make mistakes. It’s — my fault, for ever thinking, or even — letting it go so far — “

“Let what go so far? Tony, tell me what you’re talking about.”

“Ugh, you,” Tony mutters, draining his glass. “Don’t you get it? You. I was in love with you, Steve. I loved you. And you — left me.”

Steve stares. “No,” he says slowly “no, no that’s not true.”

“Really? Because I’ve got the wrists to prove it.”

“Are you — telling me that?” Steve knows he sounds bereft. “Are you telling me that I’m the reason you — that you tried — “

“Even if I hadn’t loved, you would be the reason. You ran off with my team and left me with nothing other than my brain dead best friend. You didn’t speak out at my trial. I had no one to back up my defence that Wanda catalysed me building Ultron. I lost everything, my money, my job, my friends. I mean, I could have tried to cooperate with you I guess,” Tony reasons “but why? The rest of the world agreed with me, America agreed with me, not you. And I thought — I don’t know, hey, maybe I’m the innocent one, right? I just thought that you would support me. I just — stupid, stupid Tony, I just relied on you, like an idiot.”

“You hate me,” Steve croaks. “You must hate me, then. All these months…”

“No,” Tony says consideringly. “Like I said, I did love you once, very much.”

“And?”

“And that’s hard to change. Especially when you’re so… earnest. And you’ve taken good care of me. I know I don’t verbalise it, but I do appreciate you basically forcing me to breathe, and buying me a dog, and graciously letting me stay here in the headquarters I built and designed and paid for with my own money.”

Tony sentence ends, bitter and thick on his tongue. He shuts his eyes, looks down.

“I love you, though,” Steve says, and his voice is barely there. Not even a croak, more of a whisper. “I… I still…”

He trails off. They sit in silence.

“More fools you then, really,” Tony says eventually. He pours himself another glass of wine. “Out of interest, because — this really bugged me, towards the end. Before I tried to take my life, I couldn’t stop thinking, did I do something wrong? I mean, not just that I didn’t listen to Barnes. In our relationship. Is there something I could have done differently to make you — love me more?”

“I did love you. I do, still, love you so fucking much, Tony. How could I sit here if I didn’t?”

“Guilt,” Tony notes. “But more importantly, answer the question.”

“Tony, there’s nothing you could have done. I ran with Buck because you wouldn’t listen. I knew he was innocent, I knew it. And if I had left him with Ross, I never would have seen him again.”

“And you just expected me to go along with that, despite having no evidence to back it up?”

“Yes. Yes, I’m sorry. I’m sorry it was so fucking innocent of me to expect my partner to support me, to trust me on my word.”

Tony is silent. He worries his lip. “Yeah,” he mumbles “that’s what I figured, too.”

“Jesus, Tony. If I had known — “

“Known? Known what? Steve, do you know what it’s like to have everyone just — leave you? And I mean, not have them forcibly wrenched away by — by some time spent in ice or a freak accident or aging or whatever. I mean everyone literally deciding that there are other places, other people, they would rather see. And I sunk — I sunk fucking everything into this project, Steve. Every fibre I had, I gave to the Avengers. And then you all left. I was happy. I thought — I don’t know, that I had someone who loved me? And friends. And I was making a difference. But you, you hurt me most of all, because you told me you loved me, and then you went. And after, all you could send me was the fucking letter, and you never called, and during the trials you didn’t try to reach out, and oh I know you probably had your reasons, that you couldn’t risk your team, which I understand, I understand that the good of the many comes first, but — but it hurt. You see? That’s all. It hurt me, Steve, real bad. Somewhere deep. And it still hurts. And no matter what kind of guilt driven help you think you can give me, no matter how many times you tell me you love me and force feed me till I choke, I can’t forget it. Because it happened. And I was never your first choice. I was never anyone’s first choice. Except maybe — except maybe Rhodey’s. And now he’s gone too.”

“Do you want to leave?” Steve asks, genuinely. “Do you want to leave here?”

“Where else could I go?” Tony mutters, bitter. “I don’t have anywhere else, I don’t have anything else. You told me — you told me that we would leave here,” Tony says plaintively. “You promised me we could move to the mansion, just you and me. I thought — stupid, fucking stupid of me to believe it.” Tony laughs, then. Laughs and stands and smashes his glass against the table.

“We still can,” Steve says urgently, moving to stop Tony from picking up the shards with his bare hands. “Didn’t you hear me? Listen, Tony, listen, I love you. I never stopped, please understand I never stopped. And — and what happened with Barnes had to happen. Would you have done the same for Rhodey? Answer me honestly, if you had a choice, and I wasn’t listening, would you have saved Rhodey? No matter how much you loved me?”

“I thought you might still love me,” Tony croaks. “When you told me we could move together. I — convinced myself that it might still be okay.”

“Don’t you hear me? It still can. Tony let’s go now. Let’s move away. What’s holding us back? We’re free men, we don’t have to — “

Tony kisses him. It’s harsh, and his fingers are digging into Steve’s chest, possessive, painful. It’s over in less than a handful of seconds, and then he’s pushing Steve away, collapsing so fast Steve has to hold him up. “It’s not the same,” he breathes, and then his face starts to screw up. “Oh God, it’s not the same, it’s not — “

Steve pushes his head into the crook of his neck, strokes his hair. “It’s okay,” he whispers. “Tony it’s okay.”

“It’s not okay, it’s not.” Tony is trying to pull away violently, running his hand over his hair. “It’s ruined, it’s done, I have nothing. You don’t even see it, you can’t even see how you keep lying, and lying — “

“I’m not lying. Tony I love you. I fucking love you, and we can leave, both of us. We can do it now — “

“No!” Tony cries, and he bodily pushes Steve away, punches his chest. “No! I don’t want — FUCK!” He screams, bending double, expelling the curse from deep in his chest. “Everyone fucking leaves me, everyone. My parents die, Pepper goes, Rhodey’s dead, you — you and your stupid, stupid little friend, and your fucking egotistical conflated sense of moral superiority, I gave you everything and you left, and even Sarah, Sarah — “ Tony falters, swallows hard.

“It’s okay,” Steve says quietly. “You can let it out.”

“Oh, fuck you.” Tony spits. He kicks at the table, upends some potatoes onto the floor. “Why I ever thought — I could trust you, or anyone, is unbelievable. There is no one on this earth who could ever, ever, give a shit about me.”

“That’s not true,” Steve whispers. “Tony, I — “

“Don’t touch me!” And Tony spins. He pants, slams his fists against the wall, again and again, and then cracks the door when he leaves. And Steve slumps in his chair, with Sinatra still playing in the background and his unopened presents resting on the couch.

  
Tony is pouring the bleach into a large cup. He’s mixing in vinegar. He wants to die.

He wants to die.

He pauses, just before he drinks; the smell is almost too much, he’s not sure if his body will let him swallow or try to expel it, choke him. He wavers in that moment, and it’s his undoing.

“Stop,” someone says; Barnes. The door has been thrown open, and he’s holding out his good arm, pleading. “Tony, don’t you dare.”

How did he know? Probably Tony wasn’t as discreet as he’d hoped; leaving the cupboard under the sink wide open was a tip off. Tony touches the glass to his lips and it’s thrown to the wall. Desperately, he hangs onto the carton, spraying bleach across the floor as Barnes tries to levy him out.

“Stop it!” He screams “Stop it! I want to die! I want to die I’ve had enough! Stop it, STOP IT!”

Barnes doesn’t even need two hands to hold him. He manages to drag him out only holding him to his chest, and then Tony’s screams alert the others. Steve, Natasha, Sam. Tony kicks, and spits, and tries to bite, but they push him to the ground. He screams, and screams, and screams.

Steve’s hands on his wrists, pinning him to the carpet. “It’s alright,” he says “shh, it’s alright, Tony. It’s okay.”

But he can’t stop. This goes on until his throat bleeds and colours swirl from lack of air. Things happen, he knows. Talking, shouting. A car ride and pills. Dark and light. Eventually he feels himself quieten, withdraw. Numb. That was his last chance, he thinks. He’ll never be left alone again, not after that.

Clarity returns when he’s lying on a bed. Bright light and white. He squints, coughs, and his throat is so dry. He tries to sit up; shackled, hands tied to a bed.

“It’s alright, Mr Stark,” someone says. “No need to panic. You were trying to hurt yourself, that’s all. Would you like something to drink?”

Beeping, buzzing – is he in hospital? A doctor tries to push water to his lips and Tony turns his head, stares at him from the corners of his eyes, where is he? What’s happening? Where is he now?

The doctor pads away, but Tony’s mouth is still so dry. If he strains hard enough, he can see the cup, sitting on the bedside table, still full. He licks his lips, tries to roll towards it. He cannot move.

He screams again. For a long time. Here, they don’t bother with quieting noises or patience. Someone injects him with something, and time fractures once more.

  
Tony is fiddling with the sticky tape on his wrist. He can’t rip it off, it’s stuck strong.

He’s in a rubber room. It’s not like the movies. Tony thinks he’s been put in one of these before, the soft walls and floor, like a kid’s playpen, but memory of that time is hazy. Here, the walls aren’t white, but they’re coloured a calming light blue, the floor slightly darker, and there are windows lining the top where they can’t be reached, letting in natural light.

The doctor’s have gone out of their way to make it all as non-threatening as possible. Tony doesn’t believe them. He has a theory.

That’s just the concussion talking, the second voice sighs. And that might be true. Tony’s head is still ringing from where he tried to end it against the wall of his nice bedroom two nights ago. It could also be the drugs they’ve plied him with. But that’s not the point: he has a theory.

They’re HYDRA. The doctors. He knows it. He tried to put together a suit made of bed sheets, but they thought it was a noose and took it away. He knows all the doctors are evil, HYDRA, he knows what they did to Bucky Barnes they’ll do it to him too if he’s not careful. He has to be on his guard. The doctor who asks him in the morning ‘how are you today?’ is probably the new Red Skull. His smile is too wide, his glasses fake, fake glasses with lasers imbedded, or a whole new system for analysing. Who knows what the earpiece is for, maybe it’s an AI, maybe it’s so he can give out commands. Tony tells him he’ll never break, he’ll never give away his secrets.

But then he also asks for Steve sometimes. He asks if he’s coming back. He asks if he can go home, because Mosely is waiting for him. He asks if Mosely can come here. He thinks even Steve could stop HYDRA from hurting him.

Other times are spent in blind panic. What is he doing here, why is he here? The Chitauri could be coming any moment, marching down streets, opening wormholes in the sky. He can’t build a suit out of the books they give him. The window in his room is too wide, it shows too much, he wants it to be closed, and he wants to be safe. What’s the most defensible corner of a square? He picks one on the wall with the door so no one can see him when they enter, so he can at least have the element of surprise. HYDRA can try and take his secrets but he can always have the jump on them, at least.

“Tony, who’s Mosely?” The doctor asks in one of their interrogations.

“Why?” Tony snaps “Why, do you want him, too?”

“You mention him a lot.”

“He’s my dog.”

You’re telling them too much, the first voice hisses. Stop this, they can use anything against you! Are you crazy? Weak little boy, be better!

“We can bring him here, if you’d like. We do everything we can to accommodate our patients.”

Tony spits in the doctor’s face. He throws the pens across the room. He kicks the table. The doctor takes notes.

“Would you like that?” He asks again, simply. “Tony? We’re trying to help you, here. You wouldn’t be the first patient with an aid dog. What do you say?”

Don’t you dare, growls the first voice. Don’t you dare let HYDRA bring him here. What will they do to him Tony, what will they do…

He’s just a dog, Tony, the first voice manages wearily. Why would HYDRA want him? As a matter of fact, why do they want you? You aren’t being held hostage, listen to what the doctor is telling you. You’re at a facility, you’re in the ward again. The doctor said Steve isn’t allowed to visit, and neither are any of the Avengers, because of what happened. Listen, Tony, listen to him or you’ll be sucked in here and never let out again.

Tony whimpers. His hands are in his hair. “No,” he mutters “no fucking way.”

“Are you sure?”

Tony looks up. “Sure about what?”

“About not bringing your dog here, Tony.”

That hadn’t been what he was responding to. He doesn’t know. He wants out of here, he wants to – to die, maybe. He wants Rhodey, he misses him so much. Why did Rhodey have to fall? Why did he have to fall, that was Tony’s fault. Pepper doesn’t talk to him, no one cares. He’s alone now. Why can’t he die. Why won’t they let him die.

  
They really ply him during the interrogations. Drug him up first so his lips are loose and it’s harder to stick to the truth: this is HYDRA, and he is prisoner. Repeat it, a mantra, don’t forget it or they’ll catch you.

They ask him about Rhodey and Tony screams at them. “I’ll never fucking tell you,” he says “I’ll never say a word.”

But sometimes Tony’s mind will slip, and the doctor’s will convince him that they’re not evil, that actually he’s in a hospital and he’s sick. Tony will cry then. “Sick?” He’ll ask “I’m not — I’m not sick, I’m not — “

The doctors ask him about his family. His mother and father. “You killed them,” Tony will spit “you got Barnes to kill them, didn’t you? And you want to try and twist my brain around, same as Zemo. Well it won’t work this time, you hear me? It won’t work.”

“Do you want visitor’s, Tony? You have friends who want to see you. Do you want that?”

Tony knows what that means. They’re saying, if you cooperate, you’ll go home. We’ll set you free. He knows that means he can’t surrender. No surrender. “I’ve faced worse than you,” he snarls.

“Tony — do you remember what we said yesterday? Could we go over the thinking exercises?”

“I want Mosely,” Tony wails suddenly. “I want my dog.”

The doctor springs into life. “We can do that! We can get Mosely, Tony, would you like that? Like I said, aid dogs are a common part of — “

“No! You fucking bastards, you bastards you take and you take, everyone takes from me — “

“No one wants to take anything, Tony. If we pause and go over — “

“Steve would be here,” Tony whispers. “He would be here. Anyone would be here, to find me, save me, but they haven’t come yet. Why?”

“Because this is a hospital,” the doctor says calmly, kindly. “Because we think it’s better you don’t see Steve, for awhile. Can we talk about him, Tony? Can we talk about Steve, and your relationship?”

Tony is chewing his thumb so hard he can taste blood. This is a hospital. This is a hospital? He’s insane, isn’t he? He has to be. The doctor keeps talking, kind and soft and it makes Tony want to scream. He digs his teeth in harder, feels the burst of pain, and then the doctor is trying to pull his hand away from his mouth.

Two more orderlies. They’re both very kind. Tony explains he doesn’t like the way the doctor’s talking, and that he’s tired. He asks if he can go home. The doctor’s say he can go back to his room, and they’ll bring him dinner. He asks if he can see Steve. They tell him no.

  
Days pass like this. The are meetings, and group therapies, and occasionally Tony will talk to other rich crazies with various neuroses.

He has visitors; Natasha visits, Sam visits. On one, painful occasion, Wanda visits too. They sit in the meeting room and play a board game. It’s quiet, and awkward, and Tony can practically smell the guilt on her.

They all bring him little gifts. Some fresh fruit, or bread, or cake. Wanda comes with a stack of books she said Steve found in his bedroom, and Tony is grateful, at least.

Pepper visits, one day.

Tony hadn’t — expected it. The nurse told him he had a guest, and so he had shuffled down to the lounge. And he’d searched the room for someone he recognised, and hadn’t even noticed her, because it had been so long since he’d seen her face and she’d dyed her hair. He turned to go, assuming it was a mistake, and that’s when she gently put her hand on his arm and asked “Tony?”

He’d started to cry. He couldn’t face it. He couldn’t face Pepper here, being the way he was, living like this. She had tried to console him. He had shook his head. The nurse let them come back to his room, and they sat on his bed.

“I’m sorry,” she says. “I should have said I was coming.”

“Two years,” Tony croaks. “It’s been two years.”

“I know.”

“You didn’t — you didn’t call. Or ask. Or text anyone, or do anything, didn’t you — did you see the news?” Tony asks, hoarse.

“I did.”

“Then why didn’t you — “ Tony’s breath hitches, and he has to cover his face with his hands.

“Do you want me to go?” She asks quietly.

Tony grasps her arm. “No,” he blurts. “No. It’s so good to see you. It’s so — I don’t have anyone, not from the old days. Everyone’s gone. You’re gone, Rhodey’s gone — sometimes, you know, people like Wilson and Romanoff visit, but it’s not — it’s not — “

“Not Steve?”

“He can’t. They won’t let him.”

“Maybe that’s for the best.”

Tony chews his thumb. “How long are you staying?”

“Not long.”

“Could you — could you do me a favour?”

“Of course.”

“Back at HQ, I have — I have a dog. His name is Mosely. Could you go by and just see how he’s doing?”

“Yes. A dog? I never thought you were the type.”

“Hah. Yeah. He’s — make sure they’re feeding him. Don’t tell the guards, they might — “ Tony lowers his voice. “People take things that matter, right? I don’t want to lose him too. HYDRA will do anything.”

Pepper stares. “Right,” she says “I know. I’ll keep it — I’ll keep it secret. Although — HYDRA? Where?”

“Here,” Tony whispers. “They think I don’t know.”

“Are you serious?”

“Of course!” Tony hisses.

“Have you told Steve?”

“Why do you think they won’t let me see him?”

“I’ll see what I can do about the dog, Tony,” Pepper says gently.

  
Pepper never comes back. Or maybe she does; Tony has a vague recollection of a nurse trying to tell him that he had a guest, but Tony had spat in her face. And maybe done worse. He thinks he might have done something bad, although whatever they gave him makes it difficult to remember exactly, and when he comes to his senses he’s being kept in one of the solitary rooms. Still luxurious, but removed, and they start drugging him before his therapy sessions too.

In lucid moments, Tony tries to think how exactly he got this bad. He tries to piece together his life. He thinks about his mom and dad, he thinks about Steve. He thinks about how not so long ago he was happy and full of hope.

He really, really can’t believe this is his life now.

A nurse tells him he has a guest. This surprises him; he hasn’t been allowed any for awhile, on account of his violent tendencies. The nurse tells him he should bathe, and she’ll send someone to shave his face. Tony lets them.

“It’s a lady friend,” one of the younger nurses says with a smile. “You know, you really are lucky to have so many people who care about you.”

Tony grunts. It feels strange having someone else shave him, and even now he rankles at the idea of having someone else do it for him.

They don’t let him meet people in the lounge anymore, but his guests can always come to his solitary room. He settles himself in the corner to prepare. Who could it be? Natasha, maybe. Or Pepper. Hell, not Wanda again, fuck.

Tony figures he lucks out when Sarah walks through the door. Crouches down, rests a hand on his knee; he flinches, hard. He feels feral now, not even human, and none of the fancy doctors and clean wide halls could ever fix that. He’s barely even human.

“Steve told me you were here,” she says quietly. “I went down because you wouldn’t return my calls. He said – that you had a trip up. That the doctors won’t let him visit.”

Tony’s mouth is dry. “I think they’re trying to kill me,” he whispers.

“Who?” Sarah says urgently “Who’s trying to kill you?”

“The doctors,” he mutters “they’re HYDRA. They want suits and weapons. I can’t build them. I asked Yinsen – “ Tony’s brow furrows. “I can’t remember. But Sarah they want to kill me, if I don’t…” Tony trails off; his hand is hanging from Sarah’s blouse, his fingers twisted in the material. “Help me,” he mumbles.

Sarah fishes some tissues out of bag and wipes down Tony’s cheeks. He hadn’t even realised he was crying. “Right,” she says, and her voice is thick even if her tone is matter-of-fact. “Well, would you like to leave here?”

“Will they let me?” He whispers.

“They will, if they know you’re in the hands of someone who isn’t an Avenger and who’s committed to your care. Your friend Steve is going to cover the cost, and we’ll rent a small place about five miles out of here.”

“I don’t… understand.”

“Do you want to leave?”

“Yes.”

“Would you come live with me for a while? Until you’re better?”

Tony nods. “Yes.”

“Then I just need you to hang on a few more days, alright? I promise, I’ll be back on Monday.”

“We’ll – live together?”

“Yes, Tony, until you’re better.”

“How will you pay?”

Sarah smiles wryly. “Steve considers me your carer; he’ll foot the bill.”

“But what about – your clients, your job. Your father! You said he was sick.”

Good going, the first voice sneers. You couldn’t even ask her about her dad, you whiny little cunt. How can you ever expect her to –

“My dad’s gone,” she says, very gently. “He was old, and it was peaceful. Tony, do you know how long you’ve been here?”

The nurses tell him but he doesn’t know. He shakes his head.

“Well it’s been about two months, sweetheart. And – for what it’s worth, HYDRA isn’t here. No one is trying to kill you.”

She’s wrong, the first voice whispers. Or she’s lying. She’s with them. They all want you dead, they’re all out to get you, torture you, they all want you to suffer –

Tony can’t take it. “Stop it,” he hisses, and he scrunches his hands against his eyes. “Shut up, shut up.”

“You’ll hurt yourself,” Sarah says gently “stop that, Tony.”

“I can’t – shut up,” he manages, clawing his way to lucidity. “I can’t stop thinking these things, I can’t – I make myself panic, I work myself up, but – I don’t know, there’s no one I can trust, there’s no one – “

“Can’t make what shut up, Tony?”

“Thoughts, voices, they tell me not to trust you. Me, I, I tell myself not to trust you. I can’t stop it. It’s driving me insane.”

“Can you stand?” Sarah asks. “C’mon. There’s a perfectly good pair of chairs here.”

“Can’t turn my back.”

“Ah,” Sarah notes. “Of course. This would be the best angle to see everything, wouldn’t it? Well can I get you a pillow at least?”

Tony considers. Nods.

“There’s been some food delivered,” Sarah says casually. “Would you like it?”

“It’s — poisoned,” Tony says, lacklustrely, because it suddenly sounds ridiculous even to his ears. “I don’t know what they’re trying to feed me.”

“Well, nutrition, for starters. This place does food better than any restaurant I’ve been to, Tony. Look, there’s even chocolate cake.”

“I guess — “ Tony’s stomach lurches; had he been hungry? How had he not noticed? “I guess I could take some cake.”

Sarah throws him a pillow and settles down with the cake. “Eat that,” she says “make my day.”

“You said that — that Steve had called you?”

“I drove down to your HQ. Steve said he’s been coming here everyday but they won’t let him see you.”

“Why?”

Sarah smiles sadly. “I don’t know. I think it’s complicated.”

Tony chews on his thumb. “I think — I don’t know what happened, back there. I got real low.”

“I know,” Sarah says quietly. She rubs Tony’s arm. “But it’s okay, now.”

“Is it?” Tony asks weakly. “Because — even if I leave here, I have nothing. And no one.”

“Then you can start again.”

“I’ll never be allowed to do that.”

They sit in quiet. Sarah takes a forkful of his cake and chews thoughtfully. “I have Mosely,” she says eventually, casual.

Tony stares. “What?”

“In the car. I said I’d take him off Steve’s hands. They were very good to him, but I think he misses you.”

“It’s hot, it’ll be too hot.”

“Tony it’s February.”

“Is it?” He asks mildly. “I didn’t know.”

“Me, you, and Mosely, Tony. I’m not sure of the — you know, legal aspect. I don’t think you’ll be cleared as sound of mind, but if you could get your last next of kin to make me your new next of kin — “

“Steve was. My last.”

“Well then. If you can sit tight for a few days…”

“I can.”

“And Tony, you have to be on your best behaviour. You can’t — attack anyone, or keep talking about HYDRA like this.”

“I’m sorry.”

“No, you don’t have to apologise. I know you — can’t help it, in a way. But pretend. For just a few days. And then we’ll leave, I promise.”

“Really though? Because — “ Tony huffs “ — I don’t know if I could face you — you lying, or — “

“A real promise. Now would you finish that cake please? Christ, I don’t know how you’ve managed to lose more weight since Christmas.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> started uni a few weeks ago, having an awful time, don't know when the next upload will b, hope u enjoy and comments are gr8


	5. Chapter 5

The house is detached, framed by a sizeable amount of land. A short driveway and double doors, four bedrooms, Tony’s scattered mind notes that there are too many bedrooms for just him and Sarah. Too many bedrooms. Should just be two, too much room is — places for people to hide. He doesn’t like it.  
  
He asks her if there are people hiding in the house and she tells him no. Tony doesn’t know if he can believe her, but he decides to take a chance.  
  
She sits him down in a living room and brings him coffee. It’s still cold outside, but someone has been by and already warmed the house for them. Tony doesn’t question how it came fully furnished with Tony’s favourite appliances, but later he will think Steve had something to do with it.  
  
Mosely is allowed to sit on the couch. The sun is streaming through the windows. Tony falls asleep there.  
  
  
He wakes in a bedroom. He can’t remember moving. He hands are not bound, and he’s free to move. There’s an ensuite, no razors, and Mosely rests over his feet.  
  
He can hear Sarah knocking about downstairs; the sound of coffee brewing, bacon frying. His stomach roils at the thought, but he knows if he wants to stay here he’ll have to eat. Outside the window is green fields, forest, flat enough that he can actually make out the Avengers compound in the distance.  
  
So he makes his way downstairs. “Good morning,” Sarah says chirpily. “Did you sleep well?”  
  
Tony nods. His dreams were pleasantly without fear, and instead he’d dreamt of nothing at all. She sets a heavy plate in front of him, packed with bacon, fried eggs, waffles, syrup, blueberries. It’s obscene. There’s also a glass of orange juice in a clean cup. Tony swallows. He doesn’t know how he can eat all of this.  
  
“You take your time,” Sarah says. “But you’re not leaving until you’ve eaten everything. You have to eat everything, okay?”  
  
“Can I have coffee?”  
  
“Sure,” she says warmly.  
  
Now, with his head slightly clearer, Tony is just puzzled. How can Sarah have this much patience for him? What has he got to offer her? He’s not rich, he has no power. He’s not charming anymore, nor is he good looking, not since the bags have taken permanent residence under his eyes and weight’s dropped off of him. What could she want? Why is she here?  
  
_Let’s be honest,_ the first voice mutters, _either she’s here because she thinks you still have money squirreled away somewhere, or she’s got crazy low self-esteem. Like those women who date serial killers on death row. Or hey, how much is Steve paying her to look after you? Bet it’s more than she earns. You could always just be a quick buck._  
  
_Or maybe she likes you,_ the second voice admonishes. _Ever thought of that, Tony? You can still be pretty funny when you want to be, and you’re still clever. She shares your views on so much. Maybe that’s why she has so much time for you._  
  
Tony has to physically force himself to shovel food into his mouth. It tastes of nothing, lies heavy in his stomach, thick on his tongue. Sarah is just watching him. Each time he stops, or tries to push the plate away, she reminds him he can’t leave until he’s finished.  
  
It takes an hour. The food is cold. Tony feels so full he can barely stand. “There’s a fire in the living room,” she says “you can sit there if you like.”  
  
Tony doesn’t even think he could make it up stairs like this. So he settles on the couch, blanket wrapped over his shoulders. He didn’t know it was possible to sleep this much, but it comes easy, and then he rests.  
  
  
Days pass like this. Weeks. Tony, inevitably, puts on weight. His mind – while not shaking itself of lingering fears, paranoia, and crippling depression – starts to stitch itself back to together. The days have structure and clarity. He starts to read again. He starts to have higher thinking processes again. He starts walking, and is shocked to see that spring has been and gone, and the days are getting warmer, the sun longer, the flowers already bloomed.  
  
  
  
One morning, there’s a knock at the door. This could mean anything. It could be the man who delivers their groceries, or another salesman. There’s no reason for it to be anyone Tony knows. It doesn’t have to be.  
  
He’s lying awake in bed, straining to hear the voices. Yeah, he hears them. He recognises Natasha straight away, and the thought of having to talk to her doesn’t panic him. There is another voice there, though. Lower, but somehow stranger, mumbled. Wanda? No, surely not. He hears Sarah tell them that he’s still asleep, that maybe they should have called ahead, but she’s sure Tony won’t mind. He hears her say that he’s feeling much better, that most days now you wouldn’t think there was anything wrong at all, and Natasha should relay the message to Steve and Tony’s friends.  
  
Then there are footsteps pounding up the stairs. Christ, not for him, right? Please say the guest is going to bathroom. Please, for the love of God, don’t let them come in here —  
  
Tony shuts his eyes just as the door opens, forces his breath to come slow and steady, fakes a small snore. Whoever it is just stands in the doorway.  
  
They clear their throat. “Uh,” they cough “Mr Stark?”  
  
Tony’s eyes snap open. “What the fuck?”  
  
“Oh. You’re awake.”  
  
Tony shoots up, almost banging his head on the cabinet on the wall. “You’re not supposed to _be_ here!”  
  
Peter Parker rubs the back of his neck, looks uneasy. “You were gone a long time. I panicked. I know — what I saw in the news, or whatever, but I didn’t have anyone else to give me answers. I didn’t — Mr Stark, there’s no one else I can trust now.”  
  
“So you went to Natasha?!”  
  
“She was on your side! Right? So I thought — she’ll know where he is. Look I didn’t want to bother you because I know you’re sick — “  
  
“Nice, tactful.”  
  
“That’s what Aunt May said.”  
  
“Huh?”  
  
“She said you were ill. Like, that we should say you’re ill, not — “  
  
“Crazy?”  
  
“Basically, yeah.” The kid scratches the back of his head, looks apologetic.  
Tony scrubs his eyes with one hand, swings his feet out of bed. “Okay,” he breathes. “Okay. Natasha is downstairs, right?”  
  
“Right.”  
  
“And she’s the only one you’ve told?”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
Tony thinks. It’s slow going. “We will talk about this — somewhere private. I don’t want Sarah involved. You — “ he snaps his fingers “ — pass me that gown. No, that’s a blanket. Yeah the one on the door. Nice.”  
  
  
So Tony is wrapped in the gown Sarah got him for his birthday, and his matching slippers, gratefully accepting the coffee she’s passing around, balking slightly under her warning eye. Natasha is sitting, legs crossed, flicking through one of Sarah’s albums. Peter is fidgeting.  
  
“It’s very homey,” Natasha comments. “I love what you’ve done with the place.”  
  
Sarah takes this at face value. “Thanks.” She says shortly, and leaves.  
  
“These photos are lovely,” Natasha says by way of greeting. “Does she photograph professionally?”  
  
“It’s a new hobby.”  
  
“There are lots of nice ones of you in here.”  
  
Tony reaches over and snatches the album away, tucks it under his arm. “You have ten minutes to explain why you’re here.”  
  
“I’m sorry,” Peter blurts again. “I can’t imagine what this is like for you, Mr Stark. I know you don’t — owe me anything, or — need to help me, or whatever. But after what happened in New York — “  
  
“What happened in New York?”  
  
Peter blinks. “Oh,” he says, carefully. “Uh…”  
  
“Nothing that affects us,” Natasha breaks in. “The kid said he needs tech.”  
  
“Not just tech! I wouldn’t — _bother you_ for tech, no no, I know you’re — “  
  
“Ill, I get it.”  
  
“Mr Stark I think people are after me. There are somethings I just — can’t do on my own.”  
  
Tony swallows, hard. He sips his coffee, rubs his brow. “You know I don’t — have any money, Pete.”  
  
“I don’t need that.”  
  
“I don’t have friends, either. Or influence. I couldn’t — help. You should ask Steve for what you need. He’ll put you in touch with T’challa, they’ll help keep you under wraps.”  
  
“But I need — _advice,_ I can’t just — “  
  
“This is my advice,” Tony says, probably too harshly. “Use T’challa. I can’t help you. I don’t have the mental capacity or will. I can’t — face that world anymore, understand, kid? Do you get it?”  
  
“Mr Stark — “  
  
“No, stop. You can’t ask me stuff like this anymore, you can’t — you shouldn’t have come here. Neither of you. You,” he says, glaring at Natasha “shouldn’t have given him hope.”  
  
“You’re right,” she says cooly. “It was stupid of me to think you would want to try and help this kid who — for the record — I didn’t know existed until yesterday.”  
  
Tony nearly bursts a blood vessel. “Fuck you,” he spits. “Fuck both of you.”  
  
Peter’s eyes are wide. _You’re scummy, you know that?_ The first voice mutters, insidious, preaching. _You’re a scummy little bastard, talking to a kid like that, a kid who idolises you, who’s asking for your help —_  
  
Tony is scrubbing at his face. He knows not to verbalise when he wants to tell his brain to shut up; it scares people, makes them think he’s talking to himself. He’s not, he knows the voices aren’t real, but still, the urge is there. “Listen,” Tony says, this time quietly. “Tell me what it is you need, and I’ll see if I can help. I’m not making any promises but — just tell me.”  
  
Peter fishes a small metal device from his pocket. Lobs it, and Tony catches it in one try. “Your hands are better.” Natasha notes.  
  
Tony shoots her a glare. “What’s this?”  
  
“Uh, you made it. Maps, data, everything was on it. I had access to Friday — “  
  
“Friday? How is she?”  
  
“She was fine. She talks about you a lot, it’s weird. I mean — you know, because she isn’t real. I mean she’s an AI. Anyway, it shut down last week and — it’s pretty vital. I fiddled around with it but it wasn’t going to let me in. I was wondering…”  
  
“Ah,” Tony says “yeah. No, it’s meant to do that. I forgot.”  
  
“What, shut down?”  
  
“After two years.”  
  
Tony blinks; has it really been two years since they went to war? Peter is taller, he thinks. He’s filled out, his voice is deeper. Tony blinks again, and sees that there’s stubble on his jaw. Huh? What? Even Natasha looks like she’s aged. When did that happen? How?  
  
“ — ony?” Peter’s asking. “Are you okay?”  
  
“No,” Tony blurts “yes, sorry. Yeah, thinking. Uh,” he throws the device in the air, catches it deftly. “There. Fixed it. Keyed to my biosignature, sorry. What was that about someone chasing you?”  
  
“Ross. Ross is after me. That’s it? It’s done, are you sure?”  
  
Tony taps the flat face of the device twice and it lights up with the Stark Industries logo. “Needs an update, but sure. Wasn’t he in prison or something?”  
  
“No, he was disgraced,” Natasha fills in. “But now he’s running his own… taskforce. It has public backing. A minority, but there.”  
  
“And he wants you?”  
  
“I’m not exactly subtle, Mr Stark.”  
  
“Figures, the big creep.”  
  
“I have — I have flowers in the car.” Peter blurts. “Aunt May said I should bring you flowers or something, you know, like get well soon — “  
  
“She knows your here?”  
  
“You technically never stopped paying for my education, so. She’s sort of your number one fan.”  
  
Tony frowns. “I thought my stuff was seized?”  
  
“Yeah, but you gave me money before. Like, a lot. Enough for — a lot.”  
  
“I did, didn’t I?” Tony had forgotten, what it was like to have so much money you didn’t need to keep track of where it was going. “Did you… use it?”  
  
“I’m heading to MIT in the fall.”  
  
Tony beams. “Really? That’s — hey, that’s great!”  
  
Peter grins. “Yeah, well. Like I said, she’s very grateful. Incredibly grateful, actually, she wants to thank you in person, but — “  
  
“I know. I haven’t been around lately.”  
  
“Well, if you’re around again…”  
  
“I don’t know, kid. We’ll see. But hey, now that Natasha and St— “ He coughs, clears his throat. “Steve know who you are — you don’t need me. Not really.” He passes the device back to him, awkward. “There you go. Good as new.”  
  
Peter accepts. “Okay,” he says quietly. “Well, for the record, I never needed you. I just liked having you around.”  
  
Tony smiles, a weird, half-a-smile. “Thanks.”  
  
“No problem. We should — go. Ms Romanoff needs to introduce me to the rest of them.”  
  
It sets a strange tension Tony has been carrying with him at ease. Peter’s fine. He’s got the team. And the team — doesn’t need Tony anymore, because it has Peter.  
  
See? It all worked out well in the end.  
  
  
When Tony wakes, it’s just turning light outside.  
  
He doesn’t normally get up this early, but he finds he isn’t able to get back to sleep. Twitching, he throws on a coat and boots and gently slides out the front door.  
  
Dawn is just a strip on the horizon. The air is clean, and clear. A sharp chill in the air.  
  
  
  
“Hold on. Hold on I hear someone at the door,” he hears Sarah saying, muffled, frantic. She appears in the hallway, hastily dressed in a robe, hair a mess on her head. “It’s him!” She says to her phone “Fuck he’s here. I’m sorry Steve, I thought maybe he’d — I’ll update you later.”  
  
“Do you do that often?” Tony asks calmly, taking off his coat. “Do you update Steve?”  
  
“He’s paid for your treatment,” Sarah snaps. “He deserves to know. I thought you were with him. Where the hell were you? I was worried sick. You couldn’t have even left a note — “  
  
“I was just walking.”  
  
“Just walking?! With your history? For fuck’s sake Tony, think of other people! Think of me!”  
  
“I’m sorry. I forget you care.”  
  
“Well stop forgetting,” Sarah spits, pushing him slightly. “You can be selfish sometimes, you know that? Next time, leave a note. Or wake me up. Or here’s a thought, don’t go at all.”  
  
“I thought — okay. I’m sorry.”  
  
Sarah turns away, punches her way up the stairs. “There’s coffee,” she says shortly. “Make your own damn breakfast.”  
  
Tony does. He slices potatoes and cheese and kale and makes an omelette. He pours two mugs of coffee, and carries it to the bedroom, Mosely at his heels. “Knock knock,” he says.  
  
“Oh fuck off, Tony.”  
  
He enters anyway. “I made breakfast.”  
  
Sarah has been crying. He sees it in the way she’s splashed water on her face, skin blotchy and red. “Good for you.”  
  
“It’s an omelette. It has kale.”  
  
Sarah sniffs and runs a sleeve under her nose. “I didn’t know you knew what that was.”  
  
“Sure I do. I used to have kale smoothies all the time when I was rich and had people make them for me.”  
  
“Funny.” A beat; “Set it down on the bed.”  
  
Tony crosses his legs and settles on top of the blanket. “I’m sorry I ran off like that.”  
  
“It’s fine. I mean not really, but — I’m sure you had your reasons.”  
  
“I didn’t want to worry you.”  
  
“You did.”  
  
Tony eats a bit of egg. “We were lovers,” he says casually.  
  
“What?”  
  
“Steve and I. We were lovers. Before that war.”  
  
And then Sarah is just staring at him with a look of mingled shock and horror. “You were – when you say lovers – “  
  
“Dating sounds childish. We were partners. Real, actual partners. We dated for three years, from around the first Chitauri attack right up to Siberia. After, he would tell me he still loved me. He said he wanted me to get better. He promised we would move away together, live in my old home in New York, but we never did. After I tried to kill myself for the second time he sent me back to the ward.”  
  
“I had no idea you – liked him, that way.”  
  
“It’s complicated. I think Steve is damaged. Not as much as me but – still damaged. He thinks he loves me. He’s obsessed with me, I don’t know why. He chose Barnes over me. Anyway that’s why the hospital wouldn’t let him see me. I figure they knew we were — toxic for each other.”  
  
“Lovers?” Sarah says again. “How — how is that possible? Tony, you went to _war — “_  
  
“I know,” he says smoothly. “It’s why I tried to kill myself. Wouldn’t you? I was in love with him. He ran off with someone I could never compete with. I had nothing.”  
  
“Tony, I’m sorry. If I had known — “  
  
“You didn’t know. So it’s alright. Now you do. I guess — I understand why Steve is worried. He invested a lot in me, you know, trying to fix me. There were days I wouldn’t leave my bed at all, wouldn’t eat or drink, would just lie there. He and Natasha forced me to live. I can’t say that was easy for anyone.”  
  
“Could you dial back, a moment, I’m still — “  
  
“Yeah. I know.” Tony crumbles some bread in his fingers. “Just thought you should know. In case there’s a conflict of interest.”  
  
Sarah is staring at him, like he’s a ghost, or he’s grown an extra head. “But Tony,” she whispers, “why would you go back there?”  
  
“I didn’t have anyone else,” Tony says, simply. “He said he still loved me.”  
  
  
Sarah walks on eggshells around him, for the next few days. She’s careful, as if saying the wrong thing will set him off. But those days stretch into weeks, and the weeks into months, and slowly she stops following him with her eyes, always. If Tony goes away, for a walk, into town, she no longer panics when he’s ten minutes late, or when he forgets to leave a note saying where he’s gone. They fall into routine. Natural, and safe.  
  
They don’t get many calls. So when the landline rings and Sarah’s in the shower, Tony’s almost reluctant to get it. It could be the media, like when they first found out Tony was living here, and camped outside for a week until the local police scared them away. It could be a salesman. It could be one of Tony’s doctors.  
  
So he lets it ring out, once, twice, three times. He figures none of those people would ever be so persistent, and reluctantly, he answers. “Hello?” The voice says, down the line.  
  
Tony’s mouth runs dry. “Hello?” The voice says again, croaky, rough with disuse. “Tony? Is that you? Tones? Are you there?”  
  
Seconds stretch on. He hears the voice sigh. “Wait,” he blurts “I’m here,” he whispers, furtive.  
  
The voice laughs, huffs, and then sounds, more than anything, of relief. “Jesus,” he says “I didn’t know where to find you. No one could tell me anything, there’s been nothing on the news — “  
  
“Are you real?” Tony asks, feeling like an idiot, feeling weak. Asking a question like that, it legitimises the paranoia, it legitimises the voices. But he has to, because the phone feels real in his hand, it had rang, and Sarah had told him to get it. He sinks down to the ground, phone pressed to his ear, hand fisted in his hair.  
  
Rhodey breathes out, low. “Yeah,” he says softly “yeah you know I’m real, Tones.”  
  
“You were — at the hospital, they said — “  
  
“Well, I’m awake now.”  
  
Tony shakes his head, side to side, clings to reality. “Not possible,” he chants “not possible.”  
  
“Look, Tones, I don’t know what — are you alright?”  
  
Tony makes a hysterical noise. “You’re asking me? Aren’t you — they said you were dead, brain dead. They said you were —  
  
“Are you panicking? Should I have not called? Tony this is really hard for me, it’s been years, and I don’t know what’s going on with you — “  
  
“I’m not — would you just give me a second to think? Where are you? Where are you calling from?”  
  
“Rehab. The one near old HQ, Green Roots?”  
  
Now Tony wants to laugh. “I know it,” he says “I was there. I still — it’s ten minutes away.”  
  
“You were here?”  
  
“I tried to kill myself,” Tony says, but he lets his head drop back against the wall in relief. “Twice, maybe three times. It’s okay though, I’m better.”  
  
“Jesus, Tony, how — “  
  
“You don’t sound good,” Tony says, letting concern flood his voice. “Are you okay? What did the doctors say?”  
  
“You know how sometimes you hear of just — medical miracles?”  
  
“I guess.”  
  
“Yeah. They say that’s me.”  
  
“Rhodey I — hold on,” Sarah is standing at the doorway with an enquiring look on her face. _It’s Rhodey,_ Tony mouths.  
  
Sarah then looks overwhelmingly sad, pitying, and scared all at once. “Let me check the phone, Tony.”  
  
“Uh, Rhodey hold on. Just give me a sec, I’m handing you to Sarah.” She nearly snatches it from him, wrenching it desperately from his grip.  
  
“Hello?” She asks “Anyone there?”  
  
And then she pales. Tony pales, too, because that’s worrying. But then she presses a hand to her chest, laughs. “Oh my God,” she says “you’re the Colonel. I thought you were — is that so? No no, I’m his — friend. Yes, we live together. Ha, no, just friends thank you. No no, you boys talk away. Oh, thank God, it’s really you. Green Roots? Sure, that’s only ten minutes away, Tony was — there. No, here, he’s still here.” She hands back the phone, mouths ‘sorry’, and makes a face. Tony grins.  
  
“What, Sarah? Oh no, she thinks I’m crazy. Yeah, hearing voices. Well it wouldn’t be unfounded, but you know. So here’s the question: how long does a guy have to wait before he’s allowed to visit his best friend?”  
  
  
Rhodey uses a chair, now.  
  
“I can walk,” he clarifies, after a particularly emotional reunion. “But two years spent in a bed? I’m a little rusty.”  
  
“You didn’t miss much.”  
  
“Really? Doesn’t seem that way.”  
  
“I mean, other than Steve’s pardon.”  
  
“And you.”  
  
“And me, I guess.”  
  
One of the nurses delivers coffee on a tray. She smiles when she sees Tony. “Good to see you looking so well Mr Stark,” she hums. “I like the beard.”  
  
Tony self-consciously rubs at the bristles. He’d been planning on having it sculpted the way he used to wear it, but hadn’t got round to it. “Really?” He says “I think it’s a bit middle aged, really.”  
  
“Well we have to stand up to the truth eventually,” the nurse sighs dramatically. “Jim, can I get you another pillow?”  
  
“I’m good thanks,” Rhodey smiles. “You’re a regular face around here?” He says, once the nurse has gone.  
  
“I was, for awhile. I was here for physio too. Among other things, obviously. I — do you want to see?”  
  
Tony doesn’t know why he asked. He’s never wanted to show anyone the scars before. In fact he does everything he can to pretend they don’t exist, that they never happened. Rhodes looks at him, then nods, furtive.  
  
Tony rolls back his sleeve, lays his arm out on the table. He traces it lightly with his finger.  
  
“And the other one?” Rhodes asks. “You did both?”  
  
“Both.”  
  
“Vertical,” he notes. “Strong, deliberate. Would have been deep.”  
  
“I did some real damage, yeah.”  
  
“And after that?”  
  
Tony shrugs. “Tried to starve myself. Tried to… drown myself. Starve myself a bit more. Drink bleach. Bang my head against a wall. Starve myself, again.”  
  
“How are you sitting here?” Rhodey asks quietly. “How the hell do you get up in the morning?”  
  
“Simple things. I — live for the simple things. A simple life.”  
  
“Oh yeah?”  
  
“Sarah helps,” Tony admits. “She gets me focused on the little things. You know, gardening. Walking. Cooking. Is that crazy? I’m really fucked up, Jim. I — I go to sleep at ten every night and get up early so I can walk my dog and make breakfast. Am I mad?”  
  
“That seems the opposite of mad. Seems pretty damn healthy to me.”  
  
“Yeah, but I _enjoy_ it. I never liked it before. I never liked — the quiet.”  
  
“Tony I — “ Rhodey reaches forward, grabs his hand with sudden strength. “Man, I don’t know what to say. If I could — if I could have stopped, what you went through, or taken your burden for even a day — “  
  
“No,” Tony blurts, taking his hand. That’s too oblique for him. Rhodey has always done this, always told Tony straight, social conventions be damned. “No, that’s pointless. You were sick. Dying, actually, because of me. Because you took that fall — “  
  
“Of my own damn free will, give it up,” Rhodey sighs. “Let if go. Don’t — denigrate what I did like that, man. I made my choice.”  
  
“Sometimes we make stupid choices,” Tony mutters.  
  
“Yeah,” Rhodey agrees, “you definitely do.”  
  
  
Today, he’s hiding in the closet, paper clutched in his fist.  
  
“Where is he?” He hears Rhodey ask. Sarah says something in reply, but her soft voice is nothing more than the rumble of cadence through the floor. Tony huffs a breath, kicks his legs against the wall of the closet, tries to breathe. He’s being stupid. This is stupid.  
  
“… bad day.” He catches, two words drifting up the stairs. “Wouldn’t leave bed. I know, I forget. It happens sometimes, but — but when I tried to get him to take Mosely out he threw the glass at the wall.”  
  
“Does he get violent with you?”  
  
“No! No, Jim, no, never like that. I don’t know what’s wrong, it’s — honestly it’s unlike him. I promise, these sort of episodes are so rare…”  
  
“Do you know what started it?”  
  
“He was up in the morning. He ate breakfast, perfectly fine. At some point… he went back to bed, and hasn’t responded since. I don’t know if you can talk some sense into him, I just think — he’s doing so well, he _needs_ to be talked out of situations like this.”

"I'll talk to him," he hears Rhodey saying. He listens to his footsteps, coming up the stairs. The knock on the closet door.

"Go away," Tony whispers.

Rhodey opens it anyway. “What is it?” Rhodes asks gently. He crouches. “Tony…”  
  
Tony throws the bundled up crumpled letter at him. It bounces off his shoulder. “This,” he croaks, covering his eyes with his hands and leaning against his knees.  
  
Rhodey’s eyes scan the paper. He blinks, and stares. “Tony, this is — “  
  
“Shut up.”  
  
“This is fantastic news, what the hell is wrong with you?”  
  
“You don’t understand.”  
  
“Don’t understand?! Tony, someone — was it Wanda? She’s covered by the treaty, isn’t she? Do you think — “  
  
“That she got someone to pull strings? Probably T’challa. And I know Steve’s behind it, somewhere. He’s so fucking guilty.”  
  
“I don’t know if Steve could pull this off on his own,” Rhodey says incredulously. “Jesus fucking Christ, they’re not just _unfreezing_ accounts, Tony, they’re offering to pay you back a lump sum. And you get the intellectual property back. The patents! It’s like you’ve sued them, except — “  
  
“I don’t want it. I don’t want any of it.”  
  
“You’re going to need to talk to your bankers. Get your advisor — what was his name? You know, the one with the red hair — “  
  
“I’m not doing it.”  
  
“And you’ll need to do press. Explain that you’re grateful justice has been served, that you’ve always maintained you were unfairly weighed against — “  
  
“I don’t _want it._ Don’t you fucking get it? I don’t want that money, I don’t want the patents, I don’t want the houses, and cars. I want — I can’t _do_ that anymore, that’s not me. I can’t talk to people like that. Don’t make me,” Tony croaks. “Please, Rhodey — “  
  
“You can’t let this sit. Can I be honest with you? I know you don’t want it. That you can’t take it. But Tony, we’ve reached a point where you can’t keep blocking yourself out from the world anymore. Now, you can take this money, give a few scripted interviews, shake a few hands, and then move out to Alaska and never talk to anyone again and that’s _fine._ But this is your life’s work, and your innocence, and your legacy, and to be frank I’m not going to let you throw it away over three days worth of work. Understand?”  
  
“No,” Tony spits “you don’t fucking understand.”  
  
“Fine. Think on it.” Rhodes smoothes down the letter and tucks it in his pocket.  
  
  
So, Tony is here, staring at the mirror.  
  
There are razors. There’s bath to drown in. Sarah is shopping, and won’t be home for another hour. He could drink some bleach. He could jump out the window. Any option is open to him.  
  
Tony braces his hands on the sink. He would explain it wasn’t Sarah’s fault, or Rhodey’s. That he understands they just want the best for him. But maybe the best is just him… going away. Everything would be simple then.  
  
But God, Sarah would be sad. And Rhodey… Rhodey would always blame himself. Is that fair? Tony feels like he’s going through motions. The urge to die is lessening even as he contemplates it. Why? Why does he need to die? To avoid doing something he doesn’t want to do? Who the fuck tries to kill themselves because they’ve just come into billions of dollars?  
  
He does, clearly. It’s not about the money, it’s about what it represents. And he can’t — he can’t do it without breaking someone’s heart, he realises. But he doesn’t know if he can be apart of the world the way they want him to be.  
  
He doesn’t know.  
  
So he writes a note and leave it on the table. Dials a number on his phone. Washes, dresses, and waits on the front porch. Gets in the car.  
  
  
“Where do you want to go?” Steve asks quietly.  
  
“Nowhere. Just drive.”  
  
“Do you want to talk?”  
  
“I guess.”  
  
Tony shuts his door and Steve pushes the car into gear. They head out down the drive.  
  
“You look — you look good, Tony.”  
  
“Thanks.”  
  
“Really, I mean it. It’s like — “ Steve halts.  
  
“Finish the thought.”  
  
“You look like you used to.”  
  
“Hmm,” Tony grunts.  
  
“Why did you call?”  
  
“Did you have something to do with this?” He takes the crumpled paper from his pocket, lays it out on the dash. “Dear Mr Stark,” he begins. “I hope you do not mind the informality of me writing, but I thought it was best you hear it from me before the official proceedings hit the press. As of the day I am writing, May 15th, 2018, you are to receive a lump sum of — a big number of zeros. Did you do this?”  
  
Steve keeps his eyes on the road. “I had it mentioned to me,” he says. “A friend of yours, high up. He had a sister at Green Roots, said he saw you there a few months ago. Figured that there had been a great injustice levelled against you.”  
  
“Nice of him. Do I get to find out his name?”  
  
“He would rather remain private. But he came to me, said there were grounds for reimbursement if you sued. I told him I didn’t think that was likely. Was I right to think that?”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
“So he went ahead and started to talking to people. We got a written confession out of Wanda, alongside another proclamation of innocence for _everyone_ involved in the Ultron debacle under the grounds of the new treaty. Wanda, because she was under the age of twenty-one — legal consent for inhuman activity — and then you, because you were so obviously coerced.”  
  
“And now.”  
  
“And now I know that’s not all of what you’re owed. If we’d pushed for anymore there would be some fight. But the government was happy to treat that as some bribe money, something to keep us quiet. And with your accounts unfrozen…”  
  
“I get it. I’m rich.”  
  
“I thought it was the least I could do.”  
  
“Yeah,” Tony says lacklustrely. “Great.”  
  
“You don’t sound happy.”  
  
“What did you want me to say, Steve? Did you want me to prostrate myself at your feet?”  
  
“Jesus, Tony, no. I was wondering if I did the right thing.”  
  
“Rhodey and Sarah would think so.”  
  
“But you?”  
  
“I don’t know. I guess at least now I can pay you back everything you gave Sarah.”  
  
“What do you mean?”  
  
“You know, when you paid for my treatment. Bought the house, the food, the pills, whatever.”  
  
Steve blinks, glances over at Tony, concerned. “I didn’t pay for anything,” he says. “I offered. Sarah spat in my face.”  
  
“No, for — everything. You gave her money, covered the cost of treatment. You… paid.”  
  
“Tony, I did no such thing.”  
  
“Then — who?”  
  
“Maybe she did.”  
  
Tony scoffs. “She was a physiotherapist, how the hell would she cover the cost of all that? A house? Food, bills, everything. You must have helped.”  
  
“I’m telling you I didn’t, and she wouldn’t let me. At all. I mean — I cover medical bills, I always have. You’re still under team insurance, did you know that? The medication comes with it, so she wouldn’t buy that but… I don’t know. Apartments in New York are goldmines these days. Maybe she sold up. You could easily buy a place this far in the middle of nowhere with that kind of money.”  
  
“No,” Tony mutters “she wouldn’t — _sell her house,_ to look after someone she’d known for a few months — “  
  
“Maybe she’s really just that kind,” Steve says, grudgingly. “Maybe — some people are, Tony. Does it surprise you that there’s still goodness in the world?”  
  
A beat. “I used to think that you were good. I mean — that you were kind, and — and that nothing could come close to you. Certainly not me.”  
  
“And what do you think now?” Steve asks, quietly.  
  
“I think you’re human,” Tony says, quietly. “I’ve stopped putting anyone on a pedestal. Maybe you should, too.”  
  
  
“You’re back,” Sarah is smiling. “I started the risotto. You want to finish?”  
  
“We’ll eat on the porch.”  
  
“Okay but I’ll need to clean it. Put some coffee on, will you?”  
  
Tony runs the pot under the water and taps his fingers against the counter. “I was with Steve,” he says casually. “We went for a drive.”  
  
“Oh yeah?” Sarah asks, equally lazy, but a forced kind. “And how was it?”  
  
“When were you going to tell me that you paid for this?”  
  
Sarah stops. Looks up. “I don’t know,” she says. “It depended on whether you got better.”  
  
“And if I hadn’t,” Tony presses, not angry, genuinely curious. “What would you have done?”  
  
“I guess I would have had to start taking Steve’s money eventually,” she reasons. “Yeah, probably. Or started working again.”  
  
“Where did you get the money from?”  
  
“A small inheritance from my dad. I sold my apartment. A few savings. Enough.”  
  
“Why would you do that.”  
  
“For you?”  
  
“For anyone, Sarah. That’s…”  
  
“A big commitment. I know.”  
  
“Because?”  
  
Sarah sighs. “Because I don’t know. Because I liked you. Because — isn’t it human nature to help other people who are suffering? And I needed a change, I hated New York. And you, you were — clever, and kind, even thought you couldn’t see it. I had lot’s of reasons. Not all entirely unselfish, I’ll admit — “  
  
“You want money?”  
  
“No. I mean, I didn’t just do it out of love for you, or for the sake of good human nature. I wanted a change too. I was in a position to give up everything, and so I did. And I don’t regret it. I love what we have here.”  
  
“What do we have here?”  
  
Sarah jerks her chin at the oven. “You’ll burn the rice.”  
  
Tony jumps, spins, and hastily turns down the heat. “Shit,” he mutters. “It is burnt.”  
  
“Scrape the bottom, it’ll be fine. By the way, I hope you don’t mind, but that boy who was here.”  
  
“Peter?”  
  
“Him. I invited him and his aunt for dinner next week.”  
  
“I bet. Did he leave his number with you?”  
  
“He did. And I took advantage.”  
  
“Nah,” Tony sighs “it’s fine. I have something I need to give him, anyway.”  
  
Should he tell her? Tell her how close he came to slitting his wrists?  
  
“Use the nice bowl please!” Sarah shouts back through the front door. Tony decides not to. In fact, for the first time, he feels like he’s the one protecting Sarah, and not the other way round.  
  
  
Tony has to go to Washington to sign off on the documents granting him his assets. He has to press. It’s Natasha who is helpful, who sorts out a tailor, and has new clothes bulk bought and shipped to the house. She arranges the plane tickets, and the interviews, and gives Tony lines to learn.  
  
Sarah stays behind. “You’ll be okay,” she says.  
  
“I know.” Tony replies. It’s like a second skin.  
  
And he is. It’s his first time outside of the state of New York in three years, but he’s — okay. It comes back to him, like riding a bike. He wonders what was ever so hard about this to begin with — it’s difficult to remember when he felt so hopeless he tried to end his life. If he had, he wouldn’t know what it felt like to fall asleep in the sun on the porch, or watch Peter go to college, or see the world turn, advancements made, people change. He tries to remember what he found so _hard_ about existing that he thought ending it was truly the easier option. What happened? What has altered?  
  
  
He’s rich, again. They ask him, _what will you do Mr Stark? Will you press charges? Will you be Iron Man? Will you help with the Accords?_  
  
Tony smiles, and says he’s dedicating his time to private pursuits. He tells them, you’ll see his work in the coming months. He’s got other priorities, now. He’s got a different style of life.  
  
  
They’re sitting at the table in the kitchen. Sarah is scrolling through the tablet Tony bought her — it’s not that money was tight for them before, exactly, but there was an appreciation that they couldn’t spend on frivolous luxuries. Now that Tony has more money than he knows what to do with, he’s happy to give something back.  
  
He’s reading the paper, coffee in hand. Something about — an erupting volcano, mid-terms, corruption somewhere involving off-short accounts. Nice and boring, and typical. “Tony?” Sarah says, gently.  
  
“Hmm?” Tony asks, sipping from his mug.  
  
“Tony,” Sarah repeats, too softly, too kindly, and that’s when Tony knows. She snakes her hands out across the table to cover his, pats it lightly. “I’m moving.”  
  
“Moving,” Tony says, mouth dry. “Okay.”  
  
“And — I know you’re better.” It all comes out abruptly, in a rush. “With your assets unfrozen, with the investigation under way, I know you’ll be acquitted, I’m not — I’m not a PR guru, but I know things will be better now. They’ll be better now, right?”  
  
“It’s okay,” Tony says heavily. “You don’t need to do this.”  
  
Sarah bites her lip. “Canada,” she says. “I’m moving to Canada. I want to get this photography business off the ground, and my brother says he’s willing to lend me some cash.”  
  
“I’ll lend you some cash,” Tony says dully, because he’s rich again now. He can do things like that.  
  
“No, you don’t need to do that for me.”  
  
“It would only be right. Paying you back.”  
  
“For what? You think I was here for the money to begin with?”  
  
“I don’t doubt Steve paid you well to begin with.”  
  
“That’s hurtful, Tony. That’s really hurtful, when I gave up time to care for you. And I don’t regret it, I don’t begrudge it, but — please. Don’t undermine what I did.”  
  
Tony sips. “I’m sorry,” he says quietly.  
  
Sarah squeezes his hand. “It’s why — I was going to ask you.”  
  
“Ask me?”  
  
“You’re in a good place now, I think. I mean financially. You have work coming in — I’ve _seen_ the letters in the post, people are clamouring for your services, Tony. But if — if you think that’s too much, or that’s not what you want… you can come with me.”  
  
Tony blinks, looks up. “What?”  
  
“To Canada. Come with me.”  
  
“You don’t — you don’t need to care for me forever, you know.”  
  
“I wouldn’t be your carer.”  
  
Tony stares. “What would you be?”  
  
“A friend. Or whatever — well, whatever happens, I suppose. But we’ve worked well together, here. I don’t see any reason not to let it continue.”  
  
“And — “ Tony is fiddling with a small pack of sugar. “And where would we live?”  
  
“Well, I’d rent — “  
  
“No, we’d buy a place. Are you forgetting I have money?”  
  
“Fine, we’d buy a place. A house?”  
  
“Sure. Or if you want to be central, a nice apartment. Wait — where are we moving?”  
  
Sarah laughs. “Toronto. My brother lives about an hour out.”  
  
“With Michael and Jake and Mia?”  
  
“That’s them.”  
  
Tony drinks to cover his smile. “Okay. When?”  
  
“Soon. If you’re on board, ASAP.”  
  
“Won’t I need a visa?”  
  
“I have one. You could get in on a work. Or — spousal, or something.”  
  
“Did you just propose?”  
  
“I’m proposing we get you out of this country as soon as we can.”  
  
  
Natasha is the last one Tony sees.  
  
She’s sitting on their porch, her arms folded, swinging in the large hammock Tony installed during the height of summer. “Are you going to miss it?” She asks.  
  
Tony shrugs. “Yeah, I guess. It was nice, living here.”  
  
Natasha nods. Looks up. “I didn’t know.” She says.  
  
“Okay.”  
  
“That you and Steve. That you were — before.”  
  
“I see.”  
  
“If I had known, I would have said something.”  
  
“To who?”  
  
“I don’t know, anyone. The doctors. I would have told them it was — a bad environment for you.”  
  
“And where would I have gone?”  
  
“Who fucking knows. Maybe they’d have you institutionalised.”  
  
“I probably should have been.”  
  
Natasha nods. “I’m sorry,” she says. “Do you think — you’ll ever do it again? Be Iron Man? Save the world?”  
  
“There are other ways to save the world. I’m not the only person who can fly a suit.”  
  
Natasha nods. “Yeah,” she nods, quiet, still. “I guess — I guess your getting kinda old for it now, anyway.”  
  
“Not that old,” Tony mumbles.  
  
Natasha sighs, takes his hand, traces the place where Tony’s scars are thick, sinewy on his skin. “She’s good to you,” she says. “She’s — better.”  
  
“I know.”  
  
“Do you love her?”  
  
“I don’t know. I don’t know if we’re in love. I think we love each other.”  
  
“There’s a difference,” Natasha notes. “And it’s companionship, anyway. What going’s to matter in twenty years time? That you’re desperately in love with her, or that she makes you happy, and you can sit together, and you care for her. I know what I would choose.”  
  
Tony hadn’t thought of it that way. “You’re right,” he says.  
  
“I often am.” A beat. “Well, good-bye then, Tony.”  
  
“Does Steve — uh. Does he — “  
  
“Know? No. I’ll tell him when you’re gone. Unless you want to see him, that is.”  
  
Tony feels a familiar ache, like a longing, or being hollowed out. “No,” he says, “not now. Maybe later.”  
  
  
They meet, one evening. It’s snowing, and the flakes are thick in the orange glow of the street lamp. Steve waits on the bridge, hands in pockets. Tony appears not long after, his Land Rover making deep tracks in the snow.  
  
Steve doesn’t turn to look. His breath fogs in the air. Tony joins him, there, and they both stand, looking out over the Niagara river.  
  
“I’d never been,” Steve says eventually. “I’ve never seen the falls.”  
  
“Oh yeah?”  
  
“No time, I guess.”  
  
Tony nods. “I took Sarah and the kids last year. Very kitchsy. A bit overrated.”  
  
“Thank you, for meeting me here.”  
  
“Yeah well. Figured it was time.”  
  
They stand in silence for a little while longer, until a dusting of snow has coated itself over their coats. “How’s Sarah?” Steve asks eventually. “How are the kids?”  
  
Tony fishes out his phone and proudly flicks through some photos. A little girl sitting on his shoulders in a yellow sundress, and a younger boy with paint smeared on his hands, gleefully holding them up for the camera.  
  
Steve smiles. “She has your eyes. And he seems like a handful.”  
  
“You have no idea.” Tony snorts, pocketing his cell carefully, as if losing it would mean losing them, too.  
  
“And business?” Steve asks “It’s booming, I hear.”  
  
Tony waves a hand with false modesty. “I don’t really handle the day to day. I let the boys in New York do that. I pretty much only take the special cases, you know? Suits me more.”  
  
“You like working from home,” Steve says with a huff. “So would I if I lived in a house like yours.”  
  
“Isn’t that getting a bit old?” Tony pauses, rests his hands on the rail. “How is everyone? Back there.”  
  
“Same old. You saw what happened in Iowa?”  
  
Tony exhales slowly. “A bad business.”  
  
“Tell me about it. Other than that, mostly day to day. We take a lot of international stuff now, but obviously we’ve grown so much I don’t — “ Steve almost laughs “yeah, I guess I pretty much only take the special cases, too.”  
  
“And the people?”  
  
“We’re all fine. Natasha and Bucky, they’re — well, engaged.”  
  
“That’s great.”  
  
“And Bruce is heading up a new research sector in Delhi.”  
  
“I heard.”  
  
“Sam is thinking about going out to Europe, overseeing a new division.”  
  
“He would be perfect, I guess.”  
  
“Yeah. And I’m… working hard. There’s a lot to plan for.”  
  
They fall silent again. Steve wonders if Tony’s hands are cold, without gloves.  
  
“So here we are,” Tony murmurs eventually.  
  
“Here we are.”  
  
“Do you regret it? What happened with us?”  
  
“I regret what happened to you.”  
  
“But I mean, if things had turned out differently, do you think we’d still be standing here? Or do you think — in another world — “  
  
“Would we still be together?”  
  
Tony shrugs. “I guess.”  
  
Steve sighs. He doesn’t know. “I loved you enough for it.”  
  
“So did I.”  
  
“But look at us now.”  
  
“Love doesn’t mean much at all, really.”  
  
“And we’re both happy.”  
  
“We are.”  
  
“If civil war hadn’t broken us apart… something else would have. Do you agree?”  
  
Tony considers. “I don’t know,” he says. “I think… if I hadn’t spent time in the hospital like I did, I think I would have forgiven you.”  
  
Steve tightens his fingers in his pockets. “Really?” He asks quietly.  
  
“Yeah. Sure. I loved you, very much.”  
  
There’s a long, loud pause. Eventually, Steve says: “I still do.”  
  
Tony nods. “Well,” he says quietly. “I’m sorry to hear that.”  
  
Some time passes. Tony pats Steve’s back, rubs his shoulder, heads back to his car. He drives away. His tracks are quickly covered by the snow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, did I leave this for like two years? Yes, I did. But I said I'd finish it eventually!
> 
> I know it's an unconventional ending. The story evolved as I was writing it, and I knew I couldn't end it with Tony going back and being with Steve and living happily. But I wanted to give him a happy ending, because it's important that -- what Tony figures out -- not everyone is bad and humans can be good too. And yeah. So I gave him a happy ending, where he has a perfect life, and he's 100% perfectly content. Nice.
> 
> So if you're still reading this (two years later) here you go! Thank you for taking the time to read it! And I'd love to know your thoughts!

**Author's Note:**

> if you have any questions or prompts find me on my writing blog [romanoff](http://tonystaxrk.tumblr.com/)


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